It was supposed to be the happiest day of their young lives. On a warm summer afternoon in 1985, identical twins Mariana and Liliana Chen walked through the gates of Disneyland, holding their parents’ hands and wearing matching yellow sundresses. The photographs taken that morning show the two smiling broadly next to Mickey Mouse, their dark hair tied into neat pigtails, their eyes filled with the joy of a day in the Magic Kingdom.
Three minutes after that picture was snapped, they were gone.
No scream.
No struggle.
No goodbye.
A Vanishing Without a Trace
According to witnesses, the family had been walking along Main Street, U.S.A., when the girls stopped briefly to admire a colorful parade float rolling by. Their parents, distracted by the crowd, allowed them to step just a few feet away. Then, in an instant, the twins disappeared.
Panic set in immediately. Park security launched an urgent search, closing certain gates and sweeping the area. Announcements were quietly made over internal radios, and employees scoured the park’s many themed lands. Despite the massive effort, no one found a single trace of Mariana or Liliana.
By nightfall, the search had expanded beyond the park, with Anaheim police joining in. But without witnesses, without evidence, and without a clear direction, the investigation quickly hit a dead end.
The Case Goes Cold
For years, the Chen family clung to hope. Flyers were distributed, tip lines were opened, and psychics even offered their visions of where the twins might be. Nothing materialized.
The most haunting detail, investigators noted, was the lack of any sign of distress. No one reported hearing a child scream or cry. No reports of a struggle or chase. It was as if the twins had simply been erased from the park.
By 1990, the case had gone completely cold. The police file, thick with dead leads and false tips, was moved to storage.
A Shocking Discovery in 2013
It wasn’t until 28 years later, in the summer of 2013, that something strange and deeply disturbing resurfaced.
Maintenance workers clearing a drainage system just outside the park made a grisly discovery: a mask, waterlogged and coated with years of debris, lodged deep inside a rusted grate. What made the find chilling was that the mask wasn’t made of plastic or fabric — it was fused to bone.
Forensic examination confirmed the truth: the mask was bonded to a human skull, the bone structure small enough to belong to a child.
Dental records, preserved from the 1985 investigation, matched the remains to Mariana Chen.
A New Lead — and New Questions
The discovery reignited the case. If Mariana’s remains had been hidden in a drain for nearly three decades, how did they get there? And where was Liliana?
Investigators scoured the area for more evidence and found fragments of fabric that appeared to be from a child’s dress — faded yellow with faint floral prints, eerily similar to what the twins were wearing that day. Yet despite thorough searches, no additional remains were found.
The mask itself became a focal point of investigation. It was a papier-mâché-style face covering, crudely painted with a fixed, cartoonish grin — not part of any official Disney merchandise. Experts speculated it could have been homemade, possibly to conceal a person’s identity within the crowded park.
Theories and Speculation
With the case reopened, theories swirled. Some believed the twins had been abducted by someone posing as a park employee or performer, using the mask as part of a disguise. Others suggested the mask was used to terrify or subdue the children.
More disturbing were whispers of a hidden network of tunnels and maintenance corridors beneath the park, an urban legend often dismissed but occasionally mentioned by former employees. Could someone have lured the twins underground, away from the public eye?
Former park security officers, speaking anonymously, admitted that in the 1980s, surveillance systems were far less advanced. “If you knew the layout and the blind spots, you could vanish into the park and no one would see you,” one said.
The Lingering Mystery of Liliana
Despite the breakthrough in finding Mariana’s remains, Liliana’s fate remains unknown. Some investigators hold out hope that she may have survived, possibly abducted and raised under a different identity. Others fear that her body may never be found.
The Chen family, now in their late 70s, continues to plead for answers. In a rare interview, their mother, Mei Chen, spoke softly: “We never stopped looking. Finding Mariana… it broke us, but it also gave us something we didn’t have before — proof. We just want to bring Liliana home.”
The Case Today
The Anaheim Police Department maintains that the investigation is active. Advances in DNA technology, along with renewed public interest in cold cases, could eventually lead to more answers.
The skull and mask remain locked in evidence storage, a haunting reminder of a day that began with joy and ended in tragedy. Detectives hope that someone, somewhere, remembers something — a strange sight, a suspicious person, a detail that didn’t make sense at the time.
For now, the fate of the Chen twins is a chilling reminder that even in the “Happiest Place on Earth,” darkness can lurk in the most unexpected places.
