The Changeling

Walter Collins Sr. was a bad man. In 1928, he was serving a sentence in California's Folsom Prison for a series of armed robberies. When his son, nine-year-old Walter Jr. vanished that year, authorities believed one of his father's enemies had taken the boy as revenge. A massive investigation found no sign of the boy until five months later, when a boy found in Illinois claimed to be Walter. He was returned to Christine, who insisted the child did not belong to her. She persisted in her claims until she was locked up in the psychiatric ward of the Los Angeles County Hospital. Finally, the boy admitted that he wasn't Walter. He'd only claimed to be so that he could get a free trip out to California to meet his favorite movie star, Tom Mix. Christine Collins was released, but she never saw her son again.

Walter Collins Jr.'s ultimate fate is unknown, although it has been suggested that he was probably a victim of the sadistic serial killer Gordon Northcott, known to be active in that area at the time. The events of the disappearance were dramatized in the 2008 film Changeling, which starred Angelina Jolie.