Baltimore Woman Arrested After Harboring Missing 9-Year-Old for Months

Nine-year-old Tristan King was found asleep in a Curtis Bay home on March 13, 2026, nearly two miles from where he had disappeared and 171 days after he ran from a Maryland Department of Human Services caseworker. Twelve days later, the woman he had been hiding with was in handcuffs.

Denise Day, 60, Tristan's relative and former legal guardian, was arrested the evening of March 25 in the 500 block of Chart Avenue. During a subsequent interview with the Baltimore Police Department's Missing Persons Unit, police say Day confessed to harboring Tristan and helping him elude officials for the duration of the search. She faces charges of abducting a child under 12 and abduction of a child by a relative, according to police, and was transported to Central Booking. The investigation remains active; prosecutors will determine final charging decisions and whether additional arrests follow.

The case has a backstory rooted in Baltimore's child-welfare system. Day had been assigned Tristan's legal guardian after his grandmother suffered a stroke and moved into a nursing home. Day eventually gave up guardianship, and Tristan was placed in DHS care before running from a caseworker on September 24, 2025. He was found nearly six months later, asleep in a bed with Day, after an anonymous tip directed investigators to the Curtis Bay address.

Under Maryland Family Law, a relative who knowingly shelters a child and helps that child evade official custody is subject to criminal charges for both abduction and harboring, even when the relationship was once legitimate. The distinction matters: Day was not a stranger, but a person who had held legal authority over Tristan, which under state law makes the conduct a separate felony from a stranger abduction.

The anonymous tip that cracked this case points to the single most actionable step any resident, neighbor, or school employee can take. In Baltimore, call 911 the moment a child is unaccounted for: there is no legal waiting period. Baltimore City police route missing-child cases directly to their Missing Persons Unit. Tips can also reach the Maryland Center for Missing Children, a Maryland State Police unit linked to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, or Metro Crime Stoppers by texting CRIMES to 274637. When sharing a child's image online, use photos released by police and attach only the official tip-line number. Nationally, 1,312 children had been recovered through AMBER Alert activations as of December 31, 2025, a number built one tip at a time.

Tristan was taken to a hospital for medical and psychological evaluations after his recovery and has since been placed in a treatment foster home. Gov. Moore said after King was found: "We owe Tristan action, not excuses, and we will keep working to make sure no child falls through the cracks like this again.