Four-year-old Andrew Amato vanished from the woods near his home in Webster, Massachusetts, on Sept. 30, 1978. Despite massive searches, investigators never found a trace of him. Nearly half a century later, his disappearance remains unsolved.
The case has produced haunting clues, including Andrew’s toy found in an area that had already been searched, a Mickey Mouse T-shirt discovered about 60 miles away, and an alleged deathbed confession.
The FBI is now involved, and a $25,000 reward is being offered for information.
Real cases. Real people. New England's Unsolved with Bob Ward.
The disappearance of Andrew Amato has haunted investigators
for nearly half a century.
The four-year-old boy vanished from the town of Webster in 1978.
This was one of the first cases we ever
featured on New England's Unsolved,
and we're still trying to find him.
These woods in the town of Webster are as thick and as full today
as they were nearly half a century ago
when four-year-old Andrew Amato disappeared.
Fifty years later, they're still looking for him.
Do you think after all this time?
This is a solvable case?
Absolutely.
Webster police detective Bruce Hamm took me to those woods
to retrace the last known steps of this little boy.
They all came back down here to look for him
and couldn't find him anywhere.
Andrew Amato was not supposed to be playing here.
But on the morning of September 30th, 1978,
Andrew, his seven-year-old sister Michelle,
and their six-year-old cousin Jeannie walked in anyway.
In 2001, I interviewed Michelle.
She told me they made it as far as this brook.
She was afraid to cross, but Andrew and the cousin went on without her.
He was crossing the brook, just his backside, walking away.
I waited what seemed forever before
Jeannie came out without my brother.
She came out screaming and crying,
stating that he had fallen and he wouldn't come out of the woods.
For days, police, dogs,
thousands of volunteers all searched these woods.
They never found Andrew.
But from the beginning, there have been strange turns.
The cousin remembered Andrew would
not leave the woods without his Weeble.
That tiny toy was later recovered
in a spot that had already been searched.
To this day, no one knows how it was missed.
There is more.
Two months later, a man found this Mickey Mouse t-shirt
on railroad tracks in Woburn, 60 miles away.
The shirt is similar to one that Andrew was wearing.
There's really no reason
for Andrew Amato's t-shirt to end up in Woburn.
Right.
A kid who just vanished here in Webster.
Right. You wouldn't be able to walk
from Webster to Woburn as a four-year-old kid.
In a deathbed confession in the late 1990s,
a person of interest said that Andrew was buried beneath power lines.
In 2003, I watched teams search for Andrew in Burrillville,
Rhode Island, 15 miles away from Webster.
What do you make out of the deathbed confession? Was it legitimate?
Unfortunately, we weren't able to locate Andrew,
so we're still obviously working that.
In 2025, the FBI offered a $25,000 reward for information.
The Bureau also supported a new search
of a pond in Burrillville, Rhode Island,
the same town as the power lines from the alleged deathbed confession.
One of our task force officers looking
through the case file to see that
a person of interest had frequented this area,
and so it was worth another look.
The answer to Andrew's disappearance might be here in one
of these binders, just a matter of running it down.
Webster Police Detective Bruce Hamm tells me until we
know what happened to Andrew Amato in these woods,
all options are still on the table.
My first main thing is to get Andy home to his family,
and then we'll look at what happened after that.
If you have any information about the Andrew Amato case,
contact Webster Police at 508-943-1212.
You can also contact the FBI on their toll-free line, 1-800-CALL-FBI.
Remember, there is a $25,000 reward in this case.
For New England's Unsolved, I'm Bob Ward.
