Podcast Summary: Drop Dead Serious with Ashleigh Banfield
Episode: Vanished Without a Trace?! The HAUNTING Disappearance of Lilly and Jack Sullivan
Date: October 29, 2025

Episode Overview

Ashleigh Banfield takes listeners deep into the "utterly confounding" disappearance of six-year-old Lilly and four-year-old Jack Sullivan from rural Nova Scotia, Canada. This episode dissects a baffling true crime case that has gripped the Canadian public and sparked one of the largest search operations in the region’s history. Banfield explores the facts, the timeline, and the theories—ranging from family involvement to the classic "boogeyman" abduction scenario—while weaving in firsthand accounts from family, law enforcement, and volunteer investigators.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Timeline of the Disappearance

• Setting: Rural trailer on Garrilock Road, Lansdowne Station, Nova Scotia—secluded, heavily wooded area with few neighbors.
• April 30, 2025:
  • Both children stayed home from school for a "pedagogical day."
• May 1, 2025:
  • 6:18am - School notified via attendance app that both kids would be out sick.
  • 2:25pm - Surveillance captures Maleha (mother), Lilly, and Jack in a Dollarama store.
  • 9pm - Maleha reports tucking them into bed, children still in their daytime clothes.
• May 2, 2025:
  • 6:15am - Morning alarm goes off. Maleha logs another “sick” day for both kids.
  • 10:01am - Maleha calls 911: Lilly and Jack are missing.
  • Maleha reports the kids were “possibly undiagnosed autistic” and “known to wander,” their boots were missing.

2. The Immediate Response & Early Clues

• RCMP arrive within half an hour; Daniel Martel (stepfather) claims to have already searched woods, roads, and fields.
• 4:00pm - Family member finds a pink blanket in tree branches, confirmed as Lilly’s.
• Days later, piece of the same blanket found in a garbage bag near the driveway—tested for evidence; all results inconclusive.
• No footprints, scent, clothing, or toy trails—nothing to indicate the children actually left the trailer.

3. The Search & Investigation

• Searches:
  • Ground teams, underwater dives, helicopters, drones, classified technology, and eventually, cadaver dogs brought in from British Columbia—all yielding no trace.
  • By May 7: RCMP announce “the likelihood that Lilly and Jack were still alive was very low.”
  • Biological father, Cody Sullivan, passed a polygraph and was cleared.
• Polygraphs:
  • Both parents (Maleha & Daniel) voluntarily took polygraph exams and were found to be truthful.
  • Official stance (quote from RCMP):

    “At this point in the investigation, Jack and Lilly's disappearance is not believed to be criminal in nature. I do not have reasonable grounds to believe a criminal offense has occurred.”
    (~09:50)

• Theories:
  • Family insists the children were kidnapped; RCMP maintains “wandering” as a possible theory, but questions the lack of physical evidence.
  • Suspicious vehicle sightings reported, but unverified and untraceable.

4. Family Dynamics and Fallout

• Family fractures:
  • Maleha leaves Daniel and the local area soon after the disappearance with her infant daughter. They cease contact.
  • Daniel Martel becomes the public face of the search, giving numerous interviews, maintaining innocence, and actively pushing for further investigation.
  • Grandmother Belinda Gray, the children’s paternal grandmother, joins the search but grows suspicious after Maleha's abrupt departure.

5. Publicity & Community Involvement

• June 19: Nova Scotia government offers up to $150,000 reward for usable tips.
• Volunteer group Please Bring Me Home initiates a new, last-chance large-scale search planned for November 15.
• Ongoing community vigils and Facebook page updates to keep public attention on the case.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

Daniel Martel, Stepfather, on the Search Efforts & Speculation

On Cadaver Dogs:

• [11:02] “I know for 100% they won’t find anything.”
• [11:48] “I would just like to see maybe the social media speculation, theories and accusations... maybe they’re not gonna stop, but slow down because at this point, they’re getting ridiculous.”
• [12:34] “No, because I didn’t do anything. I know Maleha didn’t do anything. I know my mother didn’t do anything. Those are three people on the property. I mean, after the polygraph exams, they should have known right there. We didn’t kill any of the kids, or we didn’t kill the kids.”

On Emotional Toll:

• [15:38] “It’s physically exhausting, mentally exhausting, emotionally exhausting. But every day you wake up and it’s a new day, new hope. Just keep going forward.”
• [17:20] “I don’t do this for myself because I’m going to see this online later and people are going to analyze it every time I move my hands, every time I open my mouth, every facial expression. They analyze everything right down to a T.”

Belinda Gray, Grandmother

• [20:14] “The last time they were here, they were still basically babies. Lilly was four. She was such a carbon copy of me... Jack was more sober. He was just crawling around the floor, learning to walk.”
• [20:48] “When I found out Maleha left, I knew there was no sense searching anymore. Started making me think. I don’t think these babies wandered off.”
• [21:01] “I hold them all accountable. I don’t know how two kids can go missing.”
• [21:14] “I don’t care what the criteria is for an Amber Alert. When you have vulnerable children missing, it should be an automatic alert.”

Ashleigh Banfield’s Analysis

• [26:30] “When kids disappear, and there’s just no explanation, sometimes it really is the boogeyman... So yeah, the boogeyman does break in.”
• She references cases like Elizabeth Smart, Polly Klaas, and Jessica Lunsford to emphasize that sometimes, stranger abductions do happen, confounding expectations and family suspicion.

Mother’s Facebook Post

• [22:20] “As a mother, I love my children more than life itself and feel so heartbroken not being able to hold my two children, Lilly and Jack, kiss them, breathe in their scent, or tuck them into bed... I will never stop searching for my children until they are found and brought home safe and sound. Someone, somewhere knows something.”

Important Segment Timestamps

• Background & timeline setup: [00:35]–[05:00]
• Discovery of the pink blanket, early clues: [05:00]–[07:00]
• Polygraphs and family cleared: [08:00]–[10:00]
• Daniel Martel’s interview and thoughts (extensive): [10:59]–[17:56]
• Perspective of paternal grandmother Belinda Gray: [19:45]–[21:45]
• Ashleigh’s case comparisons to famous child abductions: [22:45]–[26:50]
• Summary of ongoing search efforts and plea for public information: [27:00]–end

Conclusion & Open Questions

Ashleigh Banfield concludes that the disappearance of Lilly and Jack Sullivan remains one of the most mystifying modern missing children’s cases in Canada. Despite massive volunteer and police efforts and exhaustive searches, no concrete evidence has turned up to explain how two children could vanish, or who might be responsible. Banfield reminds listeners that, sometimes, stranger abductions are real, but with family dynamics broken and suspicion everywhere, the case is as open—and as cold—as ever.

Call to Action:

“If you know anything about the whereabouts of six-year-old Lilly Sullivan or her four-year-old brother Jack Sullivan, please call the Nova Scotia Crime Stoppers line... 1-800-222-TIPS.”
[28:30]

Tone:
Grave, personal, and searching—Banfield is both empathetic and analytical, pressing the urgency of hope and the heartbreak of unresolved cases.

This summary captures all major developments, emotional stakes, and the haunting ambiguity at the heart of the Sullivan children’s disappearance, as discussed in the episode.