On August 1, 1974, 11-year-old Lillian Annette Anderson and her 6-year-old sister, Mylette, vanished from their home in a quiet, secluded neighborhood in Jacksonville, Florida. The girls' mother and older sister had left them alone at approximately 6:00 p.m. to visit a sick relative. An hour later, their mother called to check on them and everything seemed normal. However, a subsequent call from their aunt went unanswered.
The girls' father, a commercial fisherman, was delayed by a faulty boat motor and arrived home at 7:20 p.m. to find the house empty.
There were no signs of forced entry; the doors were closed but unlocked. The family's small dog, which normally had free run of the house, was found shut in a bedroom. The only item missing from the home was a baby doll belonging to Mylette. Neighbors reported seeing a white car in the family's driveway between 6:00 and 7:00 p.m., but witnessed nothing suspicious and did not see the girls leave. Annette had a thyroid condition that required daily medication.
The disappearance of Annette and Mylette was one of several cases involving young girls in the Jacksonville area that year. Between July and October 1974, Jean Marie Schoen Virginia Suzanne Helm and Rebecca Ann Greene also went missing. The bodies of Helm and Greene were later found, but the cases of the Anderson sisters and Jean Marie Schoen remain unsolved. Authorities have not officially linked the cases due to the different locations of the abductions within the city.
A primary suspect in the Anderson sisters' disappearance was Paul John Knowles, a serial killer known as the "Casanova Killer," who was active in 1974 and claimed to have killed as many as 35 people. Before he was killed by police in December 1974, Knowles confessed on tape recordings to abducting and murdering two girls matching the sisters' descriptions, stating he buried them in a remote area on the west end of Commonwealth Avenue. However, investigators have expressed doubts about the validity of his confession, as Knowles was known to inflate his number of victims. Despite searches of the area Knowles indicated, no remains were ever found. The girls' father later filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Knowles' estate. The case of Lillian Annette and Mylette Anderson remains unsolved.Last Seen: Aug 1, 1974
