Death of Joseph Augustus Zarelli ("The Boy in the Box")

On February 25, 1957, the body of a young boy was discovered wrapped in a plaid blanket inside a cardboard box in wooded terrain off Susquehanna Road in the Fox Chase section of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The body had first been found days earlier by a person checking rabbit traps, who did not report it for fear police would confiscate his equipment; a college student later found the body while investigating a rabbit's movement into the underbrush and reported it the following day. The boy was nude, severely malnourished, and had multiple bruises consistent with extensive physical abuse prior to death. His hair appeared to have been cropped recently, possibly after death, and his fingernails were trimmed. He bore several scars, including surgical scars on his ankle and groin and an L-shaped scar under his chin. Authorities have said the cause of death was homicide by blunt force trauma.

The Philadelphia Police Department opened an investigation on February 26, 1957. Despite fingerprinting, widespread media coverage, distribution of hundreds of thousands of flyers, and searches by police academy recruits who recovered several inconclusive clues (a cap, a scarf, and a handkerchief), the child's identity remained unknown for decades. Investigators pursued multiple theories over the years, including a suspected connection to a nearby foster home, a claim from a woman referred to as "Martha" or "M" accusing her mother of the killing, a theory that the child may have been raised as a girl, and a possible family connection in Memphis, Tennessee — none of which were substantiated, and DNA testing ruled out the Memphis lead.

The boy's remains were exhumed in 1998 to extract DNA from a tooth, and again in 2019 for additional samples. In 2016, the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children released a forensic facial reconstruction. On November 30, 2022, the Philadelphia Police Department announced that investigative genetic genealogy had identified the child, and on December 8, 2022, he was publicly named as Joseph Augustus Zarelli, born January 13, 1953. Investigators traced his identity after a cousin uploaded DNA to a public database, leading to confirmation via a first cousin's GEDmatch profile and a court-ordered birth certificate later verified by DNA.

At a December 2022 press conference, Philadelphia Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw stated the case remains "an active homicide investigation." Both of Zarelli's biological parents, reported in January 2023 as Augustus John Zarelli and Mary Elizabeth (née Abel) Plunkett, are deceased, though Zarelli has living half-siblings. Officials said Zarelli lived in the area of 61st and Market streets in Philadelphia, and investigators have said neighbors or family members may hold information relevant to the case.

Zarelli was originally buried in a potter's field and was reburied in 1998 at Ivy Hill Cemetery in Philadelphia under the name "America's Unknown Child." In January 2023, a new memorial bearing his full name and image was unveiled. The circumstances leading to his death remain uncertain, and the case continues as an open homicide investigation.