Jack and Lilly Sullivan are seen in a handout photo from the Nova Scotia Ground Search and Rescue Association.HO/The Canadian Press
A year after the disappearance of two Nova Scotia children, Lilly and Jack Sullivan, from their trailer in the rural hamlet of Lansdowne, RCMP say they’ve made progress on the case, but not enough to determine what happened to them.
All possible scenarios related to the disappearance of the children are under consideration, RCMP Staff Sergeant Rob McCamon, acting officer in charge of major crime and behavioural sciences, said at a press conference Thursday.
A significant and sustained investigative effort with police and partner agency resources is continuing, Staff Sgt. McCamon said, adding that the chances of Lilly and Jack being alive are “very slim.”
“This is a critical question for our community – you know, children go missing and we have no answers," he said. “We’ve not let up the steam and we won’t.”
RCMP Staff Sgt. Rob McCamon speaks to reporters on May 7, 2025.Ron Ward/The Canadian Press
Despite no significant updates to the case over the past year, Staff Sgt. McCamon said police have made progress behind the scenes in the missing persons case.
“In any criminal investigation, in order to protect the integrity of it, we don’t talk about those things. But in this particular case here, we’re gathering that information and there’s operational security related to the information we gathered,” he said.
He called on the public for fact-based tips with specific, verifiable details, not the rumours and conjecture generated from the online true-crime community.
Over the past few months there has been rampant speculation from online creators and their followers peddling theories that the children were abducted, are alive, and are being held somewhere.
Staff Sgt. McCamon reiterated that police have no evidence of an abduction.
“We’d like information that points us in a direction to try and find out things that have taken place,” he told reporters.
Stepfather of missing Nova Scotia children makes first court appearance
Lilly and Jack were aged 6 and 4 when they were reported missing to local RCMP by their mother, Malehya Brooks-Murray, around 10 a.m. on May 2. She said they had wandered from the property earlier that morning while she and the children’s stepfather, Daniel Martell, were sleeping in bed with their toddler.
Helicopters, divers, dogs and ground search and rescue teams led by police scoured the thickly wooded area and waterways in the Lansdowne area, but found very little in the early days of the search – children’s boot prints that may have been Lilly’s and a piece of her pink blanket about a kilometre away from their home on Gairloch Road.
The following day the Northeast Nova RCMP Major Crime Unit took over the investigation.
Over the past year police have obtained judicial authorizations to inspect the cellphone and banking records of both the mother and Mr. Martell, formally interviewed 106 people, administered polygraph tests to family members and reviewed more than 8,000 video files. Human remains detection dogs searched 40 kilometres around the home.
Court documents show the early stages of the police investigation focused on parenting, questions that led the RCMP to interview a child protection supervisor who attended the home in mid-December 2024 to investigate a concern about Jack and Lilly’s safety and well-being. The Globe has previously reported on safety issues inside the home – drug use, multiple black eyes on the children, and alleged coercive control and physical abuse of the mother.
After the press conference, Ms. Brooks-Murray said she is grateful for the work RCMP are doing. “I want to let the police and everyone helping to bring my babies home know that they are truly appreciated and all of their efforts to get Lilly and Jack home are not unnoticed!” she wrote in a text to The Globe. “The main goal is finding them and bringing them home! I have never given up hope they will be returned home to me!”
Jack and Lilly Sullivan’s mother joins search party nearly a year after their disappearance
Mr. Martell did not respond to a request for comment on Thursday.
In an interview earlier this year, he said he hopes RCMP find out what happened to Jack and Lilly, and for them to be brought home safely.
“I just don’t understand how nothing is coming to be yet. Maybe major crimes knows something and they’re waiting for their time to strike. I don’t know. I hope that’s the case,” he said in January.
Mr. Martell has repeatedly denied having any involvement in the children’s disappearance. He said police have been checking on his mental health because of the “mob” of people obsessed with the case and daily death threats he receives on his phone. Recently, he said someone reported to police that he was at a local gas station drinking a Gatorade.
“Everybody paints me in a bad picture and I’m tired of being in that picture. I shouldn’t be grouped in with all these other people who are serial killers - ‘Daniel’s just like them.’ Like they compare me to Chris Watts. That guy murdered his family and they’re comparing me to him. That’s absolutely insane.”
In a case not directly related to Jack and Lilly, Mr. Martell was recently charged for sexual assault, forcible confinement and assault against a woman in Lansdowne whose identity is protected by a publication ban. He has not yet entered a plea, and the charges have not been proven in court. His next court appearance is May 4.