It was dark -- around 6 a.m. -- when she arrived at her job as a nurse aide at the Staten Island Developmental Center on the grounds of the former Willowbrook State School.
Workers heard the 46-year-old scream from the parking lot. By the time police arrived, Ethel had disappeared, but they found her purse, buttons from her coat, her dentures and one of her shoes just outside her parked car.
Her keys were found in the woods. Police and volunteers scoured the 300-acre property for days -- her sons looked for her in the woods for months -- but no one found any evidence of Ethel.
In August 1978, only two months before Ethel's disappearance, another nurse was found buried in a shallow grave not far from where Ethel parked her car.
Several children also disappeared from Staten Island in the 1970's and 1980's.
Could Ethel's disappearance be linked to these other cases?
For more than four decades, Ethel's family, including her four sons, has been haunted by the questions of who abducted her and why.
Eyewitness News investigative reporter Kristin Thorne returns to the woods with her family and tries to uncover clues in this terrifying cold case in the latest episode of "Missing."
ALSO VIEW | Earlier episodes of "Missing" with Kristin Thorne
CREDITS
Kristin Thorne | Writer, Producer, Eyewitness News Investigative Reporter
Stephen Cioffi | Photographer, Videographer, Editor
Emily Hartmann | Senior Digital Producer, Videographer, Editor
Rolando Pujol | EP Digital Content, Innovation and Strategy
Yoomi Chong | Creative Director, Design
Joseph Kollar | Graphic Artist
Lori Steinberg | Graphic Artist
Marilu Galvez | President, General Manager
Scott Matthews | News Director
Kim Dillon | Assistant News Director
Peter Kunz | Assistant News Director
Jim Gorham | Vice President, Marketing
Robert Monek | EP Web, OTV Digital Project Manager
Brandon Nelson | Creative Director, Brand
Johanna Trupp | Marketing Producer
Townsend Davis | Attorney
John Del Giorno | Aerial Photographer
Brandon Cook | Media Manager
Omar Rodriguez | Assignment Editor
Sarah Kim | Assignment Editor
Alex George | Desk Assistant
Rachel Schwartz | Director, Content Operations ABC Owned Television Stations
Debra O'Connell | President, Networks Disney Media & Entertainment Distribution
SPECIAL THANKS
St. George Library Center of the New York Public Library
Joshua Zeman | Director
Adrianne Owings | After Hours Productions
Ghost Robot
New York State, Office of People with Developmental Disabilities
WABC Television New York, LLC | 2022