William Tyrrell — Three-Year-Old in Spider-Man Suit Vanishes From Grandparents Yard

On September 12, 2014, three-year-old William Tyrrell was playing in the front yard of his foster grandparents' home in Kendall, New South Wales, Australia. He was wearing his beloved Spider-Man suit. His foster mother went inside briefly, and when she returned William was gone. He has never been found. The disappearance triggered one of the largest police searches in Australian history. More than 100 officers combed the surrounding forest for weeks without finding any trace. William's Spider-Man suit, toys, and all his belongings were left behind—he had no reason to wander and was described by family as a child who stayed close to adults. A coronial inquest commenced in 2019 and a 2022 inquest finding ruled that William was likely murdered, though no body has been recovered and no charges had been laid at the time of the finding. A man was eventually charged in 2023 in relation to William's death—the foster father—but denied the allegations. The image of a small child in a Spider-Man suit smiling in the yard became one of the most iconic and heartbreaking missing child photographs in Australian history. William's case prompted significant reforms to child welfare monitoring in New South Wales.