Disappearance of Tally Benanger (Doll Hospital Case)
Tally Benanger | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | Tally Lynn Benanger February 24, 1966 |
| Disappeared | November 13, 1984 (aged 18) Exeter, New Hampshire |
| Status | Missing for 38 years, 7 months and 11 days |
| Height | 5 ft 6 in (1.67 m) |
Tally Lynn Benanger (February 24, 1966 – disappeared November 13, 1984) is an American student who disappeared while walking to school in Exeter, New Hampshire, in November 1984. Police strongly believe she was abducted.
On the morning of her disappearance, Benanger was seen by a neighbor crossing the street on her way to high school. She did not arrive at school, and has not been seen since.
Weeks after her disappearance, members of her family received typewritten letters purporting to be from her, claiming she'd received a job opportunity and decided to leave home. The contents of the letters were described as inconsistent and unbalanced,[1] referring to a "hospital for dolls" where Benanger was the "new nurse."[1] Members of her family believed the letters demonstrated mental illness but proved that Benanger was alive.[5] The police completed a forensic linguistics analysis and concluded that the letters were inauthentic, likely sent by her abductor or an individual following the case in the media.[5]
The one suspect in the case, who had been convicted of sexual assault of a minor in 1979, and worked in the 1980s at a toy repair shop in nearby Hopkinton, Massachusetts, was later convicted of burglary and indecent exposure in Florida in 1992, and died in 2012.
Timeline[edit]
Disappearance[edit]
On the morning of Tuesday, November 13, 1984, Benanger left her home on River Street in Exeter, New Hampshire, to walk to the high school on Lincoln Street where she was in the twelth grade.[1] A neighbor saw her cross Court Street at approximately 8 a.m.[2] It was about 1 mile (1.6 km) to the school,[3] which Benanger had walked since she was in the ninth grade.[1] When Benanger had not returned home by 3:30 p.m., her uncle called the school, only to find out that Benanger had not been in class, and called police.[1] At the time, the school did not verify students' absences by proactively calling parents.[2][4]
In the following days, police and volunteers searched 6–8 square miles (16–21 km2) on foot and via helicopter and boat.[5] The FBI and State Police helped to investigate leads.[5] A nearby flooded quarry was searched by divers.[6] Nothing of significance was discovered, and by November 20, the Exeter police chief said he had little hope of finding Benanger alive.[7]
Suspect[edit]
In late December, WCVB-TV in Boston identified Victor Gillete, then 41 years old, as a suspect in Benanger's disappearance.[8] Gillete had been living during November in a motel in nearby Rye, New Hampshire, and was jailed on a parole violation earlier in December.[9] Gillete had been convicted in 1979 of felonious sexual assault of a female minor, his thirteen-year-old stepdaughter,[10] and served four years in prison before being paroled in July 1983.[9] Gillete's parole was revoked by the New Hampshire Parole Board on December 28, 1984, as he had left the state without informing his parole officer and had been convicted of a misdemeanor in Florida earlier in the year.[11][12]
At the time Gillete was first named in connection with Benanger's disappearance, he was also a person of interest in the disappearance of Marjorie Lunares,[8][9] who had vanished from Hopkinton, Massachusetts, in May 1984. The disappearances have similarities, as Lunares had also been walking alone on a street near her home when she disappeared, and Gillete had also been living nearby at the time and working at a toy repair business near Lunares' school.[13]
Doll letters[edit]
| External image | |
|---|---|
 Age progression of Benanger to 36 |
A total of three typewritten letters were received by Benanger's parents and uncle within six weeks of
her abduction.[5]
Members of her family believed the letters demonstrated mental illness but proved that
Benanger was alive.[5]
The full text of the letters was never released to the public, but
subsequent news coverage by
The Boston Globe
featured an excerpt from the final letter, sent to her uncle:[5]
I don't even know where how to end.
I wanted say that I'm safe.
Fate had a path for me.
I left for my job at the hospital for dolls.
I am ther[sic]
new nurse.
My doileed[sic] room
has a view of the sea, its whispers and laments. The wheel took His fortune, His hope, His baby.
Her name was mine. Every day I make Him less sad.
Do not wait for me. I am never coming home.
-Tally[5]
The contents of the other letters are unknown, though her mother described them
as "full of religion,"[5]
consistent with her daughter's personality, which she said was "always more devout
than ours."[5]
The letters were postmarked from Kittery, Maine,
a distributed municipality which includes Badger's Island, the seaside district of Kittery Point, and part of the Isles of Shoals.
The police completed a forensic linguistics
analysis looking at the grammar, word choice, and statistical similarity to school assignments
by Benanger. The study concluded
that the letters were inauthentic, likely sent by her abductor or an individual following
the case in the media.[5]
Benanger's uncle told The Boston Globe
that he thought he knew where she'd gone and intended to visit
the outer settlements of the Isles of Shoals
to look for her,[5]
but he died from a myocardial infarction
shortly after his interview
and apparently never made the journey.[6]
Benanger's parents divorced amid a disagreement about whether to keep
looking for her.[21]
The discovery of human remains in Allenstown, New Hampshire, in early November 1985 led to speculation of a connection with Benanger's disappearance; however, this was discounted by investigators.[14] The victims of the Bear Brook murders, as they came to be known, were identified years later and confirmed to have no connection with Benanger.[15]
On November 12, 1985, the day before the one-year anniversary of Benanger's disappearance, Exeter police announced that the investigation had come to a halt.[16]
In January 1992, Gillete was convicted of burglary and indecent exposure in Florida.[17] During surveillance of Gillete, police saw him peeking in the bedroom window of three young girls in West Palm Beach, Florida, a total of 14 times in less than three weeks.[17] He received a 75-year sentence as a habitual offender.[18]
In June 1994, police in Exeter opened the grave of a woman who had been buried in November 1984, apparently based on a tip they had received; nothing connected with Benanger's disappearance was found.[19]
Gillete was released from prison in Florida in April 2012,[20] and died in December 2012 in Florida at age 69.[21]
In 2013, police involved in the initial
investigation of Benanger's disappearance said that Gillete was the prime
suspect within three days.[22]
His car, blue with Maine license plates and a broken tail light, had been seen in the area when
Benanger disappeared.[22]
Also, Gillete called in sick to work that morning; he had been employed at a toy repair shop in Hopkinton, only a 80-minute drive from Exeter.[22] While police believe he killed both Benanger and Lunares, there was no supporting physical evidence and Gillete was never charged in connection with either disappearance.[22]
Benanger's parents divorced,[21] and her father, Nelson, died in September 2017.[23]
In their horror video game Doll Hospital (1989), indie game developer HugBug retells the story from
the point of view of Benanger's uncle, who travels to Lamb Island to investigate a haunted doll hospital.[24]
In her young adult novel Missing (2009), author Jacqueline Davies combines the story of Benanger's disappearance through a historical lens.[24]
In 2019, BuzzFeed Unsolved tried to solve the case.[25]
Stitch by stitch,
Comfort weaves,
Silent cries from porcelain leaves.
Later events[edit]
In popular culture[edit]
See also[edit]
References[edit]
External links[edit]