Review: Martin Cannon’s The Child Stealers (2022)

An impressive collection of American phantom social worker stories with insightful analysis

Martin Cannon is a Fortean researcher best known for his 1990 exploration of the alien abduction phenomenon, The Controllers: A New Hypothesis on Alien Abduction. The book investigates the intriguing hypothesis that the alien abduction phenomenon is the result of government mind control experiments à la MKULTRA or other similar means.¹ To say the least, much of the UFO community was not all that happy with Cannon’s book. Jack Brewer at The UFO Trail recounted that the wife of INSCOM Col. John B. Alexander called Cannon to say that “Alexander and Hal Puthoff were very angry at Cannon, for whatever reasons, and that Gordon Novel had been called on to handle the situation, whatever the situation and details of its handling specifically may have been considered to be.”² It certainly seems as though Cannon was on the right track if he was making notorious spooks this upset, but, as Brewer notes, it is impossible to say whether The Controllers was the inciting matter. Whatever the reason, I cannot help but love a researcher that ruffles that many feathers.

All this to say, Cannon has a penchant for novel approaches to the paranormal that tend to peer outside the scope of common acceptability in the eyes of the Fortean or ufological community. I was heartened to see that in a recent interview with Erica Lukes UFO Classified, Cannon called out the seeming silence of the UFO community with regards to Wendelle Stevens’ misdeeds—a topic I covered not long ago. He brings a needed fresh perspective to the phantom social worker (or PSW) phenomena in 2022’s The Child Stealers.

Phantom social workers are largely considered a phenomenon more common to the United Kingdom—would-be child abductors or otherwise mysterious creeps who pretend to be social workers to gain access to a home or child. Needless to say, it’s amazing what good parents will do when facing authority or a badge. Forteans have long considered a possible paranormal element to these weird encounters although, as Cannon notes, there is little reason to think this beyond the overwhelming surreality of the PSW visits. Cannon brings a fastidious Fortean sensibility to the topic, cataloguing examples of PSW activity in the United States throughout the last century. Some of the hallmarks: In most instances, single PSWs or even teams of them, are unsuccessful in nabbing children. Their nervous, unprofessional mannerisms are sometimes reminiscent of the MIB encounters that inundated Point Pleasant, West Virginia during the Mothman flap. At other times, their professional veneer is a little more sound. Some are ingratiating, others are rude. Some of them have intimate knowledge of the child in the home they’re targeting—as a real social worker might. Cannon writes that “most Americans know little or nothing about these phantom social workers” but he argues that “the phenomenon originated in the United States.”³ He puts forth the terrifying reality of PSW encounters that has continued into the present.

Cannon catalogues everything from lone nut baby-nappings to more orchestrated multi-person PSW teams and everything in between. I highly recommend you pick up the book to see the spectrum of PSW cases, but for a brief taste of a typical (are any of these cases typical?) PSW encounter, I’ll present a few instances Cannon covers.

In October 1996, a self-described “child abuse investigator” attempted to gain entry into a house in Lebanon, Pennsylvania. When the mother refused, she returned with a male accomplice and were let in by one of the children a week later. While they could have taken one of the children in the household, they instead took pictures. When the mother caught wind of this, she rushed downstairs, demanded identification, and the imposters ran off.⁴

In 1986 Juanita, Washington, a team of phantom social workers tried to pull off a similar stunt. A “well-dressed” man and female duo claimed to be CPS agents and were taking a child away from an unsafe home. The mother asked for identification and when the “agents” did not offer any, they were refused entry. Astoundingly, a few days later, the same duo returned with “a man dressed in an outfit similar to a police officer’s” and attempted to take the child again. The mother had the foresight to call the real police and the imposters scampered away.⁵

While these examples give a good indication of how the encounters usually go, Cannon covers other PSWs who were successful in their tasks of kidnapping or photography, specific unsolved disappearances in the early 20^th century that fall into the PSW realm such as the mind-bending Paul Fronczak mystery, and others. Each case is marked with a helpful rubric for identifying certain recurring or unique characteristics. Indeed, it’s the most complete documentation of American PSW cases available to the public which is somewhat astounding in its own right. Cannon notes that even in the better-documented UK cases, conclusions tended to be that it was a wave of mass hysteria. I am inclined to agree with his point that the phenomena is relatively well-documented in police reports and does not fall into the typical social panic mold. Cannon also gives an excellent indication of just why a paranormal solution might be enticing to researchers—the encounters are so weird, lack reason or logic, and are by-and-large unsuccessful.  But he does not leave us hanging, he offers several theories that, to my knowledge, have not been put forward in the PSW enigma.

Cannon toys with two main theses over the course of the book: 1) The PSWs are aiming to supply children for a black-market adoption network and 2) The PSWs and their cohorts are attempting to take footage and photographs of children for pedophiles. While Cannon acknowledges that these theories do not answer the full spectrum of PSW cases, they certainly explain many of them. A running theme throughout the book is a seeming lack of documentation on the trends of potential kidnappers and perverts faking social worker credentials. As Cannon says at one point: “Someone should have written a book on this topic long ago.”⁶ Thankfully, it has now been done. Highly recommended for fans of true crime and unexplained phenomena—even if this particular phenomenon has a rather earthly and unsettling solution that still has not been fully fleshed out.

Thank you as always for reading Getting Spooked. If you enjoyed this book review, definitely let me know and I will do more in the future. “It’s Always Sunny in Gulf Breeze, Florida” will be back soon. Thanks to The Anomalist for several recent shout-outs. A small update: Articles older than five months will be archived and only available to paid subscribers. This means free subscribers still have about a month to read the series so far on Bosco Nedelcovic before those posts get archived. If you’ve enjoyed what you’ve read, consider supporting the publication through a paid subscription and gain access to the archives. You can also send a one-time donation through Ko-fi if you just want to support the continuation of this research. Feel free to reach out to me on Twitter at @TannerFBoyle1 for questions, comments, or recommendations. Until next time, stay spooked.

1. The Controllers is available at the Internet Archive: https://ia801206.us.archive.org/20/items/pdf_martincannon_thecontrollers/Martin%20Cannon%20-%20The%20Controllers.pdf

2. Brewer, Jack. “John Alexander, Contradictions and Unanswered Questions.” The UFO Trail. 15 May 2012. http://ufotrail.blogspot.com/2012/05/john-alexander-contradictions-and.html

3. Cannon, Martin. The Child Stealers: Phantom Social Workers: An American Mystery. Baltimore: Silver Ratio Publishing, 2022. Page 1. Available here.

4. Ibid., page 180.

5. Ibid., page 111.

6. Ibid., page 181.