The six teenage boys spent the night drinking and having fun in the quaint suburbs, blissfully unaware they were about to become the focus of a baffling unsolved mystery.
Jay Boyle, 17, Chad Smith, 18, Robbie Rumboldt, 17, Jamie Lefebvre, 17, Michael Cummins, 17, and Danny Higgins, 16, were unwinding at a St Patrick’s Day basement party on the night of March 16, 1995. Hours later, they would never be seen again.
Despite their different backgrounds, the group had forged a close bond. Boyle, Smith and Rumboldt were from Pickering, a quiet Canadian city near Toronto. Lefebvre, Cummins and Higgins hailed from neighboring Scarborough, Oshawa and Ajax, respectively.
Boyle was a new father to daughter Kierra, and was living with his girlfriend as they raised their baby together.
But the group of carefree teenagers were swept into one of Canada‘s most enduring mysteries.
Now, the Daily Mail unravels the 30-year-old conundrum around the heartbreaking disappearance of the teenage friends who came to be known as The Lost Boys of Pickering.
Final hours
At 12.50am on March 17, 1995, the group left the house party and headed to the nearby East Shore Marina at Frenchman’s Bay to ‘goof around.’ Police believed their intention was to steal a boat for a joyride on Lake Ontario.
Yet in a further twist, only three of the boys – Cummins, Lefebvre and Rumboldt – were captured on grainy surveillance footage breaking into the marina at 1.48am.
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On March 17, 1995, six teenage boys seemingly vanished in the small Canadian city of Pickering, Ontario. Pictured: Chad Smith, 18, Danny Higgins, 16, Jay Boyle, 17, Jamie Lefebvre, 17, Michael Cummins, 17, and Robbie Rumboldt, 17
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The Lost Boys of Pickering left a St Patrick’s Day party and headed to nearby East Shore Marina at Frenchman’s Bay (pictured) to ‘goof around.’ Police believed their intention was to steal a boat for a joyride
Higgins was said to have argued with Boyle at the party and left early, and there is no evidence to confirm he followed the group to the marina that night.
Two boats were later reported missing – a 14-foot Boston Whaler-type and a water tricycle – and between 2.30am and 3am, locals heard the sound of a motor boat near the docks.
Without life jackets, the teenagers would have swiftly drowned or succumbed to hypothermia if a boat had capsized.
The search effort officially began 36 hours later.
It was massive – involving the Durham Regional Police, Toronto Police Marine Unit, Coast Guard and over 1,000 volunteers.
But no trace of the boys and their belongings, or either of the missing boats were ever found. The search was called off after less than two days. It is unclear if an underwater search was ever conducted.
Theories ranging from murder to people trafficking, to the boys running away to start new lives, ran rampant.
Scrutiny was also placed on the boys’ backgrounds. They were allegedly well-known to the police, and Boyle is said to have done time behind bars for assault and was facing more assault and weapon charges when he went missing.
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Lake Ontario, one of the five great lakes, is a foreboding, eerie place. Measuring in at 7,340-sq-mi, the chilly waters stretch to a depth of 244m
After three of the boys were seen on surveillance footage breaking into the marina, two boats were later reported missing – a 14-foot Boston Whaler-type boat and a water tricycle (stock image of Boston Whaler Montauk)
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Intriguingly, Ricketts noted in his book that after three of the missing boys were seen on tape breaking into a marina, three people – two females and one male – were filmed entering the marina at 2.10am – they have never been identified (pictured center)
The family theory
Boyle’s family have maintained he would never intentionally have left his daughter, who is now 31.
His sister Amanda said in a 2018 interview that the boys had stolen boats in the past. ‘It’s not out of the ordinary that that would happen,’ she said. ‘To me, I honestly believe that they did drown.
‘As much as I know he’s gone I just don’t understand how they never found anything.’
Only a gas can, which was linked to the missing Whaler boat, was found – 2,451 miles from Pickering in Wilson, New York.
Lake Ontario, one of the five North American great lakes, is a foreboding, eerie place. Measuring in at a mammoth 7,340-sq miles, the chilly waters stretch to a depth of 244 meters.
In 2021, 14 drownings were reported in the lake’s unforgiving waters, which contain at least 41 shipwrecks.
But Ottawa private investigator Bruce Ricketts has worked on the Pickering case for more than a decade and in his book, The Lost Boys – What we Know and What we Believe, he writes that there is ‘no concrete evidence’ to support the theory the boys drowned on the lake.
Ricketts died in 2024 – without ever finding the truth.
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In 2021, 14 drownings were reported in Lake Ontario’s unforgiving waters, which already contain at least 41 shipwrecks including the St Peter (pictured)
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Renowned true crime medium Jonathan Mark (pictured) believes there are a group of witnesses who saw the incident but have failed to come forward in the 30 years since. He saw ‘something getting compacted and crushed’ in an exclusive reading for the Daily Mail
True crime medium Jonathan Mark, whose expertise has been sought by the FBI and police forces across the country, has exclusively given his insights on the cold case to the Daily Mail.
Mark, who has never worked on or heard of the case, was given only the name of the disappearance (‘The Lost Boys of Pickering’) seconds before beginning his reading.
‘My first thing I’m seeing is a body of water. The boat disappears, like it essentially has fallen off the face of the earth,’ he said.
‘They’re teenagers, they’re cheers-ing me, which is drinking – they went from drinking to a boat, that’s what I’m seeing.
‘They’re throwing their hands up, that indicates distress, something happened on the boat that caused a huge distress. It wouldn’t be like it ran out of gas or something… they may have drifted into a place where only certain people can get to that spot because they know about it.
‘They keep showing this motion to me when something gets compacted and crushed. The water was really rough.’
Mark believes there are a group of witnesses who have failed to come forward in the 30 years since.
‘There’s people that were not on the boat but saw them or saw something. It looks like it’s definitely one female. There’s either video footage or something and this could be a huge turn in the case,’ he said.
‘That could mean there were people there that didn’t say anything. There’s people that saw something either in the beginning or the middle. I’m very curious about whether someone will step up and say something.
‘I keep seeing a restricted area, them going to a place where the public or people can’t really get to and them being underwater and squeezing tight.’
Intriguingly, Ricketts noted in his book that after three of the missing boys were seen on tape, three people – two females and one male – were filmed entering the marina at 2.10am.
Mark said he believes the six missing teenagers passed away shortly after their disappearance – ‘I had the sense they all weren’t here.’
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Only a gas can, which was linked to the missing Whaler boat, was found, 2,451 miles away from Pickering in Wilson, New York
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In 1998, three years after the vanishing, a pair of red Levi’s jeans – identical to the ones Boyle was wearing on the night of the disappearance – were recovered in the trash mesh at the Sir Adam Beck Hydroelectric Generating Station, next to the Niagara River, in Queenston. They contained remains, however DNA testing ruled out that the trousers were Boyle’s
Shelly McKinney, a cartographer with Florida-based volunteer organization Sunshine State Sonar, which provides cold case underwater recovery, told the Daily Mail the inexperienced teens could have encountered treacherous, ocean-like conditions while on the lake.
‘There could have been bad weather conditions, with white cap waves,’ she said.
‘There have been other vessels that have gone missing in bad weather, and it’s taken hundreds of years to find them.’
McKinney believes the case could be solved with advanced underwater search methods, but due to the mammoth size of the lake, this would likely take years and be very costly.
‘It would be like searching for the Titanic,’ she said.
McKinney suggested using side-scan sonar – a system that detects and images objects on the seafloor, and led to finding the wreck of RMS Titanic in 1985 – could be the breakthrough in the case.
Given that the search was suspended after only 36 hours, McKinney believes that stopped any realistic chance of finding any of the teenagers.
‘Finding nothing is bizarre,’ she said. ‘Something could have gone wrong – and lots of items on boats float, so to find nothing with six people onboard is definitely strange.
‘It’s a sad case, I understand why they haven’t been found. If they are in the water. It takes a lot of resources to find them.’
In 1998, three years after the vanishing, a pair of red Levi’s jeans – identical to the ones Boyle was wearing on the night of the disappearance – were recovered next to the Niagara River in Queenston.
They contained remains, however, DNA testing ruled out that the trousers were Boyle’s.
The families gather each March 17 at Frenchman’s Bay to remember the boys, and to keep their memories alive in hopes that one day they will finally learn what happened.
The Daily Mail has contacted representatives for The Durham Regional Police Service Department for comment and has yet to hear back.
