Jacob Pritchett was 11 years old, autistic and nonverbal, and so small for his age that some of his Brownsville, Brooklyn neighbors assumed he was only 7. He lived with his mother, Jacqueline Pritchett, in an apartment near Howard Avenue and Sutter Avenue — until he vanished, and she began insisting to investigators that she had never had a child at all.
A Welfare Check That Led Nowhere
According to the Charley Project, which maintains the case file on Jacob’s disappearance, neighbors said Jacob lived in the Brownsville apartment and had simply stopped being seen. Jacob never attended school; his relatives said Jacqueline was homeschooling him, and his father is listed as unknown. The last confirmed sighting of Jacob, per the Charley Project, was April 2, 2025, though a National Center for Missing & Exploited Children poster lists June 1, 2025, as his last-seen date, and a NamUs case record lists October 1, 2025, as the date of last contact — the dossier does not resolve which date is accurate.
Neighbors told responding officers they hadn’t seen the child for six to eight weeks, the New York Daily News reported. Police and a New York City Administration for Children’s Services caseworker, prompted by a 911 call, went to the apartment on October 1, 2025, to find him — and he wasn’t there, according to the New York Times.
The Apartment That Smelled Like Cleaning Products
What officers found inside was strange in its own right. The apartment was spotless and had the pungent scent of cleaning products, and police could see toys in the bathroom and in the closet, the Times reported. Jacqueline reportedly told them the toys were hers, even as she maintained she lived alone and had never had a child.
Investigators didn’t stop at the apartment. Per the same Times account, police later scoured hundreds of hours of surveillance footage from the building and found no images of Jacob at all. They also traveled 330 miles upstate to search a landfill where the building’s garbage had been hauled, sifting through 2.9 million pounds of raw garbage without finding any sign of the boy. NYPD cadaver dogs, meanwhile, got a possible blood hit in the refrigerator and on a mattress found in the dumpster behind the building, according to PIX11.
A Mother's Repeated Denials in Court
Jacqueline appeared at least ten times in Brooklyn Family Court and invoked her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination each time, the Charley Project reports. On October 10, 2025, Judge Dawn Marie Orsatti issued a civil warrant charging her with contempt for refusing to reveal where her son was, and she was sent to Rikers Island, according to the Times. She was released in December 2025 after her lawyers argued she shouldn’t be held for exercising her constitutional rights, per the Charley Project.
The investigation into Jacob’s disappearance remains active, according to News 12 Brooklyn. Investigators believe Jacob may have been the victim of a homicide, though his case remains formally unsolved, the Charley Project notes, and PIX11 reported that the NYPD planned to work with Brooklyn prosecutors to build a possible homicide case. No charges have been filed against Jacqueline or anyone else in connection with her son’s disappearance, per the Charley Project.
No Photograph Exists of the Missing Boy
Because no photograph of Jacob has ever surfaced, authorities instead released a composite sketch to the public. The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children states the rendering was created by the New York City Police Department to show what Jacob may look like, since there is no photo available.
As Chip Chick has reported on the case, Jacob’s disappearance has drawn renewed attention months after the initial search efforts turned up nothing. Anyone with information is asked to contact the New York Police Department at 718-495-5425.
