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Disappearance of the Skelton brothers
The disappearance of the Skelton brothers concerns three boys, aged 9, 7, and 5, who vanished from Morenci, Michigan, over Thanksgiving 2010 and have never been found.
Disappearance of Théo Hayez
Disappearance of Théo Hayez: Belgian backpacker, 18, who vanished from Byron Bay, NSW, on 31 May 2019 after leaving Cheeky Monkeys; last phone trace at Cosy Corner; 2022 coronial inquest found he likely died 1 June 2019, cause undetermined.
Disappearance of Timmothy Pitzen
Timmothy Pitzen, missing Aurora, Illinois boy, vanished May 11, 2011 during a Wisconsin trip with his mother Amy Fry-Pitzen, who died by suicide; case remains open, unsolved, no charges.
Disappearance of Toni Sharpless
Toni Lee Sharpless, Pennsylvania nurse missing since August 23, 2009, after leaving a party at 76ers player Willie Green's home; her Pontiac Grand Prix and plate DND-7772 were never found despite a Camden plate hit.
Disappearance of William Tyrrell
Unsolved 2014 disappearance of three-year-old William Tyrrell from his foster grandmother's yard in Kendall, NSW, while wearing a Spider-Man suit; Strike Force Rosann, a $1 million reward, a long-running coronial inquest, and an unproven police accidental-death theory involving the foster mother.
Discharge (sentence)
Discharge (sentence): a criminal-law outcome where a court finds guilt but imposes no punishment. Two forms, absolute and conditional discharge, in England and Wales, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, and US states like New York and Illinois.
Discipline and Punish
Discipline and Punish (Surveiller et punir) is Michel Foucault's 1975 genealogical history of the prison, arguing that penal reform shifted punishment from the body to the soul through disciplinary power, hierarchical observation, normalizing judgment, the examination, and Bentham's Panopticon.
Disclosure and Barring Service
Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS), UK Home Office non-departmental public body created 1 December 2012 from the CRB and ISA merger; issues Basic, Standard, Enhanced and Enhanced with Barred List checks for England and Wales and maintains the children's and adults' barred lists.
Dismemberment
Dismemberment (lingchi, 凌遲) is the judicial cutting apart of the body, used historically as an execution method, a treason punishment, and a posthumous sanction; Qing China recorded about 1,140 lingchi executions before its 1905 abolition.
Disorderly conduct
Disorderly conduct, also called breach of the peace or disturbing the peace, is a misdemeanor covering conduct that disturbs public peace, morals, or safety, varying by jurisdiction and often challenged as vague or overbroad.
Diversion program
Diversion program: alternative to prosecution or incarceration routing defendants into treatment, education, or community service; includes pretrial, prosecutor-led, police-led (LEAD), mental health, and juvenile diversion, with mixed recidivism evidence and lower case costs.
Dixie Mafia
Dixie Mafia: a loose confederation of white Southern criminals active from the 1960s, based in Biloxi, Mississippi, with no formal hierarchy or ties to La Cosa Nostra; known for Gulf Coast corruption and the 1987 Sherry murders.
Dnepropetrovsk maniacs
Dnepropetrovsk maniacs (дніпропетровські маніяки): Viktor Sayenko and Igor Suprunyuk, two 19-year-old Ukrainians who killed 21 people in Dnipro in June–July 2007, filmed some attacks, and received life sentences in 2009; accomplice Hanzha got 9 years.
Doc Holliday
Doc Holliday (John Henry Holliday, 1851-1887), Georgia-trained dentist turned gambler and gunfighter, Wyatt Earp's friend, O.K. Corral participant, died of tuberculosis in Glenwood Springs, Colorado; grave location unknown.
Doca da Penha
Doca da Penha (Edgar/Edgard Alves de Andrade, alias Urso), born 1970, is a Brazilian Comando Vermelho leader of the Complexo da Penha, Rio de Janeiro; a fugitive since 2016/2017, target of the October 2025 mega-operation, with 112 homicide records and a R$100,000 reward.
Dodge Correctional Institution
Dodge Correctional Institution (DCI), Waupun, Wisconsin: maximum-security prison opened 1978 on the former Central State Hospital site, serving as the central reception, assessment, and medical center for all adult male inmates entering the Wisconsin DOC.
Domenico Cefalù
Domenico "Italian Dom" Cefalù, Sicilian-born Palermo native and Gambino crime family boss 2011–2015 (some sources say 2011–2019), succeeded by Frank Cali; convicted of heroin conspiracy, contempt, and extortion in Operation Old Bridge.
Domenico Papalia
Domenico "Micu" Papalia (1945–2026), 'ndrangheta boss of Platì who with brothers Rocco and Antonio established the clan in Buccinasco-Corsico near Milan; imprisoned 49 years from 1977, acquitted of one murder in 2017, convicted for others, released July 2026, died in Milan.
Domestic violence against men
Domestic violence against men is abuse by an intimate partner or family member, including physical, sexual, and psychological harm. In England and Wales, 13.8% of men experienced such abuse.
Dominic Noonan
Dominic Noonan (Domenyk Lattlay-Fottfoy), born 1966, is a Manchester crime figure who with brother Desmond headed the Noonan crime family, controlled nightclub security including the Hacienda, featured in A Very British Gangster, and was jailed in 2018 for child sexual offences.
Dominick Napolitano
Dominick "Sonny Black" Napolitano (1930–1981), Bonanno crime family captain, sponsored undercover FBI agent Joe Pistone (Donnie Brasco) and was murdered in 1981, his body found in Staten Island with hands severed.
Dominick Occhicone
Dominick Anthony Occhicone (born 1945) was a Florida death-row inmate executed July 28, 2026, for the 1986 murders of Raymond and Martha Artzner, his ex-girlfriend's parents, in Holiday, Pasco County; at 80 he was Florida's oldest executed inmate and part of its first same-day double execution since 1964.
Don "Magic" Juan
Don "Magic" Juan (Donald Campbell, born 1949 or 1950, Chicago) is a former pimp turned preacher, Players Ball founder, Snoop Dogg's spiritual advisor, and actor in American Pimp and Hollywood cameos.
Donald Harvey
Donald Harvey (1952-2017), American hospital orderly nicknamed the Angel of Death, pleaded guilty to 37 patient murders in Ohio and Kentucky hospitals using cyanide, arsenic, suffocation, and respirator sabotage; claimed up to 87 victims; beaten to death in prison in 2017.
Donald Henry Gaskins
Donald Henry Gaskins, known as "Pee Wee," was an American serial killer from South Carolina who pleaded guilty to eight murders and claimed about one hundred victims.
Donald Neilson
Donald Neilson (1936-2011), the Black Panther, English armed robber who murdered three sub-postmasters in 1974, kidnapped and killed heiress Lesley Whittle in 1975, and died in prison.
Donna Hylton
Donna Hylton (born 1964), Jamaican-American activist and author of A Little Piece of Light, served 27 years at Bedford Hills for the 1985 Vigliarolo kidnapping-murder, was paroled in 2012, and now advocates for incarcerated women.
Donner Party
Donner Party (Donner–Reed Party), an 1846 California-bound wagon train of about 80 pioneers stranded by Sierra Nevada snowstorms in winter 1846-47; about half died, survivors resorted to cannibalism, and archaeology at Alder Creek found no human bone.
Donnie Andrews
Donnie Andrews, born Larry Donnell Andrews (1954–2012), was a Baltimore stick-up artist and convicted murderer who inspired The Wire's Omar Little and later founded the anti-violence charity Why Murder?.
Doodler
The Doodler, also called the Doodler Killer, is an unidentified San Francisco serial killer who murdered at least six gay men in 1974-1975 after sketching victims in gay bars; a 1976 suspect was never charged and the case remains open.