For 37 years, Missouri mother tells son to never open box in freezer. But he breaks the promise only to question his entire life

In the summer of 2019, Adam Smith, then 37, called the police after discovering that a box his mother had kept in their freezer for his entire life actually contained the mummified body of an infant. Smith had been cleaning out his mother’s St. Louis apartment in the immediate aftermath of her death from lung cancer.

Stories about parents leaving behind hidden items for their children are not uncommon, but they are usually benign — even sentimental. Sometimes it’s a valuable piece of comic-book history. Other times, people move into old apartments and stumble upon love letters tucked away by former occupants. These objects are rarely meant for a specific person; they are simply left behind, waiting for someone to find them.

For Smith, the discovery felt like a disturbing amalgamation of those stories.

He told KSDK News that he had seen the box his entire life. Whenever the family moved, his mother made sure it came with them. Once they settled into a new home, she would place it at the back of the freezer. Whenever Smith asked what was inside, his mother would brush him off, insisting it was just the top of a wedding cake.

EXCLUSIVE: A disturbing discovery in south St. Louis. Police are investigating the death of a baby. But tonight, we get more details from a man who found the baby wrapped in a pink blanket in his mom's freezer. Catch the full story at 6 on @ksdknews. pic.twitter.com/juSKoL9SQT

— Justina Coronel (@JustinaCoronel) July 29, 2019

There have been other cases of mothers secretly keeping the bodies of infants. In Pennsylvania, for example, a landlord once discovered three dead newborns stored on a tenant’s property after evicting her. Maternal grief is complex and can manifest in deeply troubling ways.

Smith’s case also appeared to carry a similar emotional context. When he finally opened the box, he found a baby wrapped carefully in pink fleece — a detail that suggested a form of care rather than neglect. Smith later explained that his mother had lost a child years before he was born, and he believed the frozen remains belonged to that baby, whom he referred to as his sister.

In interviews, Smith described his mother as intensely private and secretive. He said he tried multiple times over the years to ask about the box, only to be firmly shut down. It was a clear “no-go zone” in their relationship, and eventually, he stopped asking altogether.

Police initially treated the discovery as suspicious and launched an investigation, saying more information would be released following a full autopsy. In 2023, First Alert 4 reported that the autopsy revealed the infant was a boy who had died sometime in the mid-1960s and was under one year old at the time of death. The cause of death could not be determined. Authorities were, however, able to confirm that an unidentified caller who contacted police about the case was related to the child. Many questions remained unanswered.

Reflecting on the discovery, Smith said, “Finding this, I’m more confused than anything. I’m angry, and I just want closure. I want to know more answers.” The identified caller reportedly learned about the case through press coverage in 2022 and claimed she might be the infant’s twin. Police collected her DNA and determined that she was, in fact, a half-sibling of the deceased child. To this day, detectives say many of the details surrounding the case remain unresolved.