Diana Moon Yoli and Mark Yoli (Endangered Missing)

On a September afternoon in 1962, 7 year old Diana Moon Yoli took her younger sibling Mark to the local park. The 2 and a half year old loved to play on the slide and Diana always took great care of her little brother. The playground was  less than two blocks from their family home which was situated close to Camp Lejeune, a Marine base just outside Jacksonville, North Carolina. An hour later the children's mother Marilyn went out to look for them but they were gone.  A few leads materialised early on but they led nowhere and  Marilyn never saw Diana or Mark again. It was thirty years later that the local sheriff received a phone call from someone claiming to know what had happened to the missing siblings.

Sources for the episode can be found here


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Transcript

Diana Moon Yoli and Mark Yoli

This episode deals with a crime committed against a child. Please exercise self-care when choosing to listen.

Camp Lejeune is a United States Marine Corps base located in Onslow County, Jacksonville, North Carolina. Today it is the largest Marine Corps base on the East Coast and the second largest in the world. The base is named after Major General John Lejeune, the 13th Commandant of the Marine Corps, and it was established in 1941 as a training base for Marines during World War II. 

In 1962 Corporal Ronald Eugene Yoli worked at Camp Lejeune as a mail clerk. Corporal Yoli had served in the Marines between 1950 and 1954 and had taken part in three battle campaigns. He was awarded the Purple Heart after being wounded in Korea. After a four year stint as a civilian he rejoined the Marines in 1958 and for the last three years had been based at Camp Lejeune. His role working in the mail room gave him considerable responsibility. He was a quiet man, known to be a reliable and trustworthy worker. 

Originally Corporal Yoli was from Columbus Ohio, which is where he met his wife Marilyn. Marilyn had been married previously to a man from Springfield, Tennessee named Freeman Moon. This union had produced two children, a son, Rance and daughter, Diana, spelt D-i-a-n-a. As a note the name is often spelt D-i-a-n-e and even D-i-a-n-n-e in many reports, which would normally be pronounced as Diane rather than Diana. It seems the family may have used both variations. Modern agencies also refer to the little girl by both names. For example the Chaley project uses Diana and NCMEC, Diane. It seems to change all the time since I have decided to go with Diana. 

After moving to Jacksonvile Ronald and Marilyn had a child together, a boy named Mark. In September 1962 he was two and a half years old, Diana was 7 and Rance 8. Both Marilyn and Ronald were in their late 20’s. The couple and the three children lived just off base in a neatly kept two bedroom home on the 700 block of Butler Drive in the Midway Park housing development. The housing development was separated from the base by a dual lane highway, the N.C 24. It was a quiet area with little traffic and a lovely playground situated closeby. Midway Park elementary school, which Diana attended, was a few metres away from the playground. There were many young families with children in the area so there were plenty of other children around for the Yoli siblings to play with. The neighbourhood was just about as safe as they come and crime was practically non-existent.

In the early afternoon of Thursday September 13th 1962 Diana returned home from school and sidled up to her mother for a cuddle. The exhausted pair lay and rested together. Marilyn was tired after her usual routine of looking after a bouncy toddler while trying to complete her daily chores. Diana was worn out from being in class all day.  Little Mark was taking a nap in his bedroom. Older brother Rance came home from school and went out playing with his buddies.

After a little while Mark woke up and came and joined his big sister and mum. All three lay together enjoying each other's company. As so often happens, having recharged their batteries the children experienced a renewed burst of energy and decided they wanted to play. Diana helped Mark change his clothes into something appropriate for going outside. Just after 3pm Diana asked her mother if she could take Mark to the playground, he loved it there. There were swings and a climbing apparatus on the far side of the park but Mark's favourite was the slide. Marilyn readily agreed. Diana was a responsible older sister and always took great care of her little brother. She never let him out of her sight. The pair left at 3.30pm and made their way to the playground, situated just one and a half blocks away.

An hour passed and the children had not returned. This was a little longer than they would normally be out on their own. At 4.30pm Marilyn wandered over to the playground to look for them. When she got there she saw a man playing with his children but Diana and Mark were nowhere to be seen. Marilyn then went over to a friend's house as she knew Mark loved to play there. The children were not there and the friend had seen neither hide nor hair of them. Marilyn returned to the house to get the car as she thought it would be easier to find them.

Marilyn drove around the neighbourhood but became increasingly frustrated and worried. Her thoughts drifted to an article she had read in the newspaper about an incident that had occurred in a Jacksonville department store over the previous weekend. A man had broken into the store and sexually assaulted a wooden mannequin. Marilyn later told the News and Observer newspaper that she thought a quote “fiend” may be on the loose. 

Marilyn next went to a neighbour’s house and asked if they could help search. There were now two cars driving around the locality trying to locate the missing children. Unfortunately they saw no sign of them. At 6.30pm Marilyn abandoned the search and notified the military police based at Camp Lejeune.  All she could do now was wait.

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Jacksonville police led by Sheriff Tom Marshall were involved in the search for the children but the overall operation came under the authority of the base Provost Marshal, Colonel John G Babashania. The initial theory was that the children had gone off on their own to explore the wilderness that lay ¼ mile or half a kilometre from the playground.

Newspapers reports stated that Diana had a history of disappearing off on her own. On September 19th 1962 The News Observer described  Diana as, quote, “a chronic wanderer”. They relayed a story of how some months before the little girl had wandered off and was found several hours later in another part of the neighbourhood, asleep in a car. This incident had been somewhat exaggerated. The truth was that during a particularly hot night over the previous summer Diana had been unable to sleep. She had got out of the house and got into her parents’ car and fallen asleep. In the morning Ronald and Marilyn awoke to find Diana's bed empty and they began to worry. The night before, Marilyn had watched an episode of the police procedural tv drama show  “Naked City” in which someone had kidnapped a child. She immediately began to suspect the worst. Thankfully after some time Diana was found and the parents breathed a sigh of relief. On this occasion there would not be such a  happy ending. 

The local terrain was challenging to cover even for battle-hardened Marines. Behind the Midway Park elementary school which stood next to the playground lay thick woods. There were also many waterways and points of access that may have been tempting for the children to venture near. Mark was said to be fascinated by water. Marilyn explained to reporters that when the toddler saw a lake or river he would say “I’d like to thwin in it”. Recalling the way her youngest said “thwin” instead of swim made her well up in tears.

New River runs for 50 miles or 80 km through southeastern North Carolina and it passes along the north boundary of Camp Lejeune. Lamott's Creek, a tributary to the north-east of New River, ran just behind the housing development. It was about 182 metres from where the Yolis lived. The banks were very steep in places and covered in thick vegetation. 

Patrol boats went up and down Lamott's Creek, and a stretch of the New River was searched, but no sign of the children was found. The searchers decided not to drag either creek or river

It was also possible the children had headed in the other direction. Between the highway and the Marine camp was a small shopping centre and several marine shops. On the other side of the highway lay the vast camp which was surrounded by yet more dense woods, rivers and swampland.

The number of Marines involved in the search soon swelled to one thousand from the 2nd Marine division. Most of the ground was covered on foot or by 4 wheel drive vehicles and bloodhounds were brought in. Helicopters were not used; they were deemed useless because of the thick coverage of underbrush.

By Sunday September 16th the search party had been reduced to 500 and they began retracing ground they had already gone over. The search teams focused on abandoned houses and barns as well as discarded fridges. Anywhere a child could conceivably climb, or crawl or fall into was checked.  

Not a single clue had turned up. However unlikely Marilyn and Ronald  clung to the hope  that a passing motorist had picked the children up and was taking care of them. 

While the theory that the children had gotten lost and had possibly had an accident was the most likely scenario, other possibilites were looked into.

Over August Diana and had spent a couple of weeks staying with their father, Freeman Moon, in Springfield, Tennessee. Two weeks before the children went missing Freeman had driven Diana back to Jacksonville. Freeman’s mother had also travelled with them and another man, who Marilyn described as a “stranger”. It was considered that Freeman may have taken the children.Police questioned Freeman but were satisfied the children were not with him. It is said that Freeman cooperated fully with the investigation and offered any assistance he could to help find his daughter and Mark.

The other possibility was that the children had been abducted by a stranger, though as of yet no solid evidence existed for this. On Monday September 17th Lieutenant H E Stackpole, an information officer working for the military police, told the press foul play had not been ruled out but there was no indication that anything untoward in that way had happened. A statewide bulletin was put out to highway patrol officers. The following descriptions of the children were given:

Diana was fair and pretty. She had blonde hair with a fringe or bangs. (Her hair is sometimes referred to as strawberry blonde). Her eyes were blue. She stood at 4 foot 4 or 132 cm and weighed 50lbs or 23kg. Diana was last seen wearing a sleeveless spring blouse, with flowers over a white background, light blue shorts, white socks and white tennis shoes. 

Mark was stocky and had an olive complexion. He had brown hair and brown eyes. He was 3 foot or 91 cm and 35lbs, 16kg. (His hair is sometimes called dark blonde). Initially he was said to be wearing a brown shirt and brown shorts but this was changed. Marilyn had forgotten that just before the children headed to the playground Diana had helped Mark to change his clothes. Ronald helped Marilyn remember the clean clothes Mark had put on. He had actually been wearing dark brown shorts and a light blue striped t-shirt. On his feet he wore gold to buff coloured shoes with a crepe sole. Ronald added in one report that his son also was in need of a haircut. 

Both children were said to be friendly and confident speaking to adults. Whenever Mark would go past the main gate to Camp Lejeune he would say good morning to the guards on duty. Marilyn was adamant, however, that Diana would not get into a car with a stranger and reiterated that she would never leave Mark's side.

The FBI offered their lab and identification facilities should the need arise but officially were not working the case as there was no evidence the children had been kidnapped.  The State Bureau of Investigation (SBI) did get involved in the case and an agent was sent to work with local law enforcement.

Marilyn Yoli was really struggling to cope with the situation. Ronald was said to be “bearing up” under the strain but his tough Marine exterior undoubtedly masked the stress he was feeling. Raymond’s parents travelled from Ohio to stay with the family and  provide support. The days ticked on with no news.

A twist came when the Durham Sun reported on September 24th that Marilyn Yoli had sent a letter to a resident of Durham to say two children matching Diana and Mark’s description had been seen at a Greenville service station. Greenville is about a 1 hour 40 minute drive north of Onslow County. Durham is a further 2 hour drive east of Greenville.

The service attendant saw two children in a station wagon pulling an aluminium trailer. The vehicle is said to have possibly been a 1957/58 blue (or green) Mercury  with out of state licence plates. This incident had happened some time during the previous week, reported as either the 13th or 14th of September. Either on the day or the day after the children went missing. The driver of the station wagon had asked the attendant for directions to Durham. There were several adults in the car. They were described as Roma or Indigenous American. (The newspapers at the time used derogatory terms to describe the people in the car.) This car was believed to have been accompanied by an older model Cadillac which was also pulling a trailer.

Just a day or so later police throughout North Carolina were instructed to look out for three Roma people. The Winston Salem Journal reported that one man and two women were seen with the children who matched the descriptions of Diana and Mark. The children were said to have been upset and crying when they were seen by a witness.   

SBI director Walter Anderson added caution to these reports, saying he was not sure of the reliability of this sighting. Nevertheless he urged the public to contact the SBI in Kinston or Raleigh if they had any relevant information.  

25 reports came in, mostly from Durham, Wake and Franklin Counties in the north of the state. Most had very little substance to them and were simply reporting any Romani people they came across on the road. One witness account from September 17th did mention seeing a little blond boy with curly hair travelling with a group of Roma. It was believed this could be Mark. In the photograph I've seen Mark didn't have curly hair, though his father had said he was in need of a haircut at the time he went missing. 

On September 28th the Salisbury Post reported that police were detaining a man and a woman in connection with the missing children's disappearance. The pair were being held in Georgetown, in neighbouring South Carolina. The names of the detainees were not given but Marine authorities were flown in from camp Lejeune by helicopter to talk with the individuals.

Within 24 hours it was made known that two entire families had actually been held for questioning. They were described as migrant workers travelling to Florida to work in the fruit and vegetable fields over the winter months. One family was Mexican and the other from Puerto Rico. 

A senior military police officer and the children's father Ronald Yoli arrived in Georgetown to ascertain if Diana and Mark were among a number of children who were travelling with the two families. After spending ten minutes with the families Ronald was sure that Diana and Mark were not within their number. Ronald returned to Onslow County downcast and empty handed.

At this juncture the SBI released additional details about the day Diana and Mark vanished. This information had been uncovered during enquiries around the Midway Park residential area. Investigators were pretty confident that Diana and Mark had played with two other children from 4-6pm on the afternoon they went missing. At this time the siblings' young playmates went home for their evening meal. Diana and Mark were last seen walking in the opposite direction to their home.

At 6pm a woman is then said to have spoken to the children. She spoke to the girl and asked her name. She replied “Diana”. The woman told investigators the girl turned to the little boy and said “I wonder how far we’ve gone. Let's go this way”. The children then headed east which was in the opposite direction to their home.

Between 6.05pm and 6.10pm two men, said to be reliable witnesses, saw a woman of about 40 years old with two children. One of the witnesses said the woman had long black hair and a little girl was playing 3 to 5 metres in front of her. A couple of metres behind the woman was a little boy, about the same size as Mark, playing in the dirt. This witness said the woman was wearing loosely fitted dresses like those worn by the Roma community.

It was the description of this woman that prompted investigators to develop the theory that the children had been taken by Romani people. Despite not stopping and talking to numerous Romani groups travelling across the state, no evidence of this was found. Nevertheless, the theory that a group of Romani people may be involved in the children's disappearance was not abandoned. Towards the end of November 1962, over two months since the disappearance, SBI director Walter Anderson told The News and Observer that the best lead they had in the case was the sighting of this mysterious woman. 

From my research it's fair to say that prejudice undoubtedly sullied some of the information that made its way to police. It's difficult to decipher if there was any substance at all to the idea of travelling Roma having taken the children. It appears the whole theory stems from the one witness mentioning the description of the dress.  

Hundreds of Roma families were questioned throughout the state but the woman with black hair was never identified. Spokespeople from the Roma community stated many times that they did not believe the children had been kidnapped by anyone associated with them. They saw no logic to this idea as they said we have plenty of children already! The woman with long black hair was never identified and it is unknown if she had any involvement with the children's disappearance. With all the hype surrounding the sighting the woman may have been too fearful to come forward even if she was innocent of any wrongdoing. 

Investigators opened up about some aspects of the case they had previously kept secret. They chose to release information about a couple of other leads that had arisen early on in the investigation, but were soon dismissed. Two pairs of children’s shoes were found on the banks of Lamott's Creek close to the Yoli residence. Marilyn and Ronald said they were not the shoes the children had been wearing on the day they went missing. Strangely two more pairs of shoes were discovered on the shore of the New River in downtown Jacksonville. A small child’s doll was also found here. Again, the items did not belong to Diana or Mark. On September 25th a girls slip and boys shirt had been found in the town of Winston Salem, a four hour drive from Onslow County. It was also proven that these items did not belong to the Yolis. 

The new year brought a public announcement from SBI director Anderson that they believed the children had been abducted. The children's father Ronald was said to agree with this conclusion. Provost Marshal Lt Col John G Babashanian, who had coordinated the search, categorically stated that the children did not get lost in the woods. SBI director Anderson added there was a possibility that the children had been taken by someone who was lonely and wanted children. 

For many decades this is where the investigation stalled. No trace of the children was found and the truth of what had happened to them could only be speculated upon. 

In 1992, after thirty years of silence, the then Sheriff of Onslow County, Ed Brown, received a telephone call from a person claiming to know what had happened to Diana and Mark. Sheriff Ed Brown had grown up in the area and was in high school when the Yolis went missing. He remembered the incident well and had joined the police force only a few years later, hoping to one day solve the mystery.

The person who had called the sheriff was a 75 year old woman named Marjorie Hunt. Marjorie was frail and close to death and wanted to get something off her chest before she died. It was a dark secret that she had kept for three decades. Unfortunately before the police were able to organise an interview, Marjorie passed away in June 1992. However, before she passed she unburdened herself of the information she had been holding back all these years. On her deathbed Marjorie told her youngest daughter that her ex-husband was responsible for the deaths of both children.

Marjorie told her daughter that on Thursday September 13th 1962 her husband, Henry Morris Hunt, returned home and asked her if she would accompany him to the beach. That evening as the couple sat looking at the ocean, Henry told Marjorie that he had picked up Diana and Mark near the Midway Park playground. He had driven them to a lake where he kept a boat and then took the children out on the lake to fish. According to Hunt, Mark somehow fell into the water and drowned. Hunt claimed that he didn’t know what to do and in a panic murdered Diana in order to cover everything up. Hunt then said he sailed the boat to a rock quarry in Marysville to dispose of the children's bodies.

Marjorie remained married to Henry Hunt until 1972 when the couple divorced. It is not clear why Marjorie waited so long to come forward with this information. Any attempt to explain her decision would be speculation on my part.

What Marjorie shared was a shocking revelation and blew a long dormant cold case wide open. Unfortunately Henry Hunt could not be questioned about the accusations made by his ex-wife because had died just a year before in 1991 at the age of 85.

For Sheriff Brown it seemed very plausible that Marjorie’s account was true. Brown remembered hearing stories and rumours about Henry Hunt back in the early to mid 1960’s .More on that shortly. First of all, some background information on Henry Morris Hunt.

Henry Morris Hunt was born in Morelville, Franklin County, North Carolina on October 15th 1906. His parents were CD Hunt and Lela Hunt. Hunt stood at 5 foot 8 or 173 cm and weighed approximately 160 lbs or 73kg. He had black hair and brown eyes with a dark complexion. On December 11th 1934 he married Marjorie Manning (Born December 8th 1917). 

In 1940, at the age of 34, Hunt was drafted into the US military and served in World War II. At this time Henry and Marjorie  lived in Fayetteville, North Carolina. By 1950 the Hunt family were living in the small town of Farmville just outside Greenville in Pitt County, North Carolina. The couple now had two daughters, aged 11 and 14. Hunt's occupation is described as a painter and he worked for a garage.

At some point over the next decade the Hunt family moved to Onslow County, North Carolina. They lived at Pony Farm Road about 13 miles or 21 km from the Yoli residence in Midway Park. 

Onslow County Sheriff Ed Brown remembered the Hunts from when he was in highschool. He dated a girl who lived in a house which backed onto Henry and Marjorie Hunt's yard. There was always a lot of local gossip about what went on in the house because Henry Hunt was a convicted sex offender. Try as I might, I can find no specifics on the crimes Hunt had been convicted of. While I have not come across this explicitly, my research has led me to suspect that Hunt was looked into at the time of Diana and Mark's disappearance.  

After hearing of Marjorie's deathbed confession, Sheriff Brown believed that Henry Hunt was responsible for the children's deaths. However, he doubted Hunt had been completely truthful in the story he shared with his wife, particularly about where the children’s bodies had been disposed of. I’m sure like many others I also have misgivings about Henry Hunt’s claim that Mark's death had been an accident.

Brown recalled that the girl he dated as a teen had an Alsatian dog which whenever it got out of the garden would head straight for the crawl space at the Hunts. It would then start obsessively sniffing the ground. Sheriff Brown theorised that Hunt may have buried the bodies of Diana and Mark under a crawl space at his property. 

The problem was that Brown did not have enough probable cause to obtain a warrant to dig up the ground under the house. Another family was now living at the property and he couldn't tear the house down based on a hunch.  Sheriff Brown bided his time and the Hunt’s former property on Pony Farm Road changed hands a few times over the next couple of decades. In 2011 the house was sold to a developer who had plans to knock the old house down and redevelop the site. 

Sheriff Brown met with the workers on the site and asked them to look out for anything suspicious when they were demolishing the property. On Wednesday February 23rd 2011 Brown got a call to say they had found a shovel, jawbone and two other small bones underneath the floorboards of the house. A child-sized pink vinyl belt was also found by the workers as the house was raised to its foundations. 

Sheriff Brown and Detective Sergeant John Dubois went quickly to the scene to take a look at the finds and assess the situation. Brown used an old coat hanger to make a  divining rod to see if he could discover if there was a cavity in the ground under the house. Everytime he walked over the spot where the items were found the rod freely moved from side to side.

A crime scene investigator named Tim Morton studied the bones but could not tell at first glance if they were human or animal. DS Debois and Sheriff Brown both concluded that the bones had been cut and bore saw marks. There was hope that after all these years some closure may be close at hand for the family of Diana and Mark. It was not to be, as lab tests determined the bones were not human. Police were unable to ascertain who had owned the small pink children’s belt.

I should say here that while police considered looking for the children's remains at the rock quarry where Henry Hunt claimed he had disposed of the bodies this was eventually deemed pointless. The quarry  had changed a lot over the decades and had been flooded several times. It was a vast area and there was no way of determining where to even start looking. 

Despite not finding the remains of Diana and Mark at the property on Pony Farm Road, Sheriff Brown, (who is now retired) believes the children were murdered. Henry Hunt is the most likely suspect. The National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children have said they are never going give up trying to find out what happened to Diana and Mark.

Whether the woman with black hair had any involvement in the children's disappearance is unknown. We can’t even be sure that the children seen near her were Diana and Mark.

It is true to say that the abduction of multiple children at once by a stranger, particularly siblings, is very rare. Nevertheless the effects of such incidents are devastating for the family. There are some infamous unsolved cases where we hear about the terror of such crimes and the suffering of the loved ones left behind. These include the Beaumont siblings 1966, the Mackay Sisters from Queensland  in 1970, the Millbrooke twins from Georgia 1990 and the Fandel Siblings from Alaska 1978. The names of Diana Moon Yoli and Mark Yoli are also part of this terrible list.  

If you have a tip about the 1962 disappearance and presumed abduction of Diana Moon Yoli and Mark Yoli please call the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children on 1-800-THE-LOST.  (1-800-843-5678).

Sources 

https://tinyurl.com/mpzcx9ns