Van ished
C Nana Rosenberg and her
two children are some-
where in the world, but no
one can find them. Not the
children's father, not the police,
not the FBI.
Chana Rosenberg disappeared
five years ago following a custody
dispute with her ex-husband,
Yitzhak Rosenberg of New York.
Today, police and the FBI believe
she may be living in the Midwest,
and have issued a warrant for her
arrest.
Each year, the National Cen-
ter for Missing and Exploited
Children (NCMEC) handles thou-
sands of cases, most of which in-
volve runaways, or abductions,
both by family members and
strangers. Established by the Jus-
tice Department in 1984, the non-
profit agency produces the
familiar mailings and posters that
ask, "Have you seen...?"
Annette Chana Rosenberg
Birth: 02/07/56
Sex: F
Race: White
Height: 5'9"
Weight: 150 lbs.
Hair: BROWN Eyes: BROWN
Alias: ANNETTE COHEN
Id Info: She has a lump between her
eyes and she wears wigs. Also known
as: Annette Bergen; Chana Cohen;
Channa Bergen; Annette Rosenburg.
Her photo is shown age-progressed to
35 yrs.
Circum: FBI Unlawful Flight to Avoid
Prosecution warrant issued 01/14/91.
Among the agency's recent cas-
es is that of D'Wan Christian
Sims, whose mother reported him
missing from the Wonderland
Mall in Livonia in 1994. Three
years earlier, NCMEC took on the
Chana Rosenberg case.
It was hardly ordinary from the
start. To begin with, the case in-
volves a Chasidic family. Then
there were the charges against
the father: attempted murder and
sexual abuse. And all this was ac-
companied by stories of bizarre
behavior, photos purportedly
showing child pornography,
threats of suicide.
A few clues, a handful of re-
ported sightings, have surfaced
since Chana Rosenberg's disap-
pearance. But for the most part,
investigators remain mystified by
the disappearance of Chana and
her two children. Chaya and Zelig.
Y
itzhak Rosenberg is a na-
tive of New York who met
- his former wife, Chana,
though a matchmaker. He
is a Vizhnitser Chasid, whose sect
originated in a Ukrainian town in
the Chernovtsky oblast (former-
ly the Romanian province of
Bukovina). Chana was Orthodox,
but not Chasidic.
The couple hadn't been mar-
ried long before the problems
began.
"She had two or three person-
alities," Mr. Rosenberg said of his
former wife. "One was nice, one
was medium and one was very
nasty."
(Editor's note: The Jewish
News contacted the family of
Chana Rosenberg, who refused
comment on any aspect of the
case.)
Mr. Rosenberg worked man-
aging a bus company; his wife was
a registered nurse. Their first
child, Zelig, was born May 3, 1982.
Soon after, Chana was gone.
"One day I came home and the
house was empty," Mr. Rosenberg
said.
A neighbor had seen Chana
drive away in a blue car — that
was all Mr. Rosenberg knew of
her disappearance. He filed a
missing-person report.
One wek after leaving, Chana
called from Los Angeles. She
wanted to come home. Despite
their problems, Mr. Rosenberg
said he was eager to give the mar-
riage another chance.
"You can't think negative right
away," he said. "You've got to at
least give it a try."
After the reconciliation, Chana
said she wanted another child,
and she decided to stay at home.
Her husband was pleased. "I
didn't get married so that my wife
should go back to work," he said.
Mr. Rosenberg found a new job
in a tire shop, and he and his wife
had a second child, Chaya, born
Feb. 5, 1986. But the problems
continued.
Mr. Rosenberg said his wife
seemed unhappy at home. "I
guess" she loved the children, he
said. She would scream, though
never physically harm them. "She
never had patience for the kids,"
he said. "She always had other
people take care of them."
Mr. Rosenberg said he offered
to see a marriage counselor, and
met with all the rabbis his wife
recommended. But by 1988 it was
clear the marriage was over.
Soon after Rosh Hashanah that
year, Chana approached Yitzhak.
"We're not for each other. Give me
The strange story of a Chasidic family,
allegations of abuse and a mother who
disappeared.
ELIZABETH APPLEBAUM ASSOCIATE EDITOR
letter from the Internal Revenue
Service asking why he had failed
to report the full extent of his fi-
nancial holdings. Apparently,
Chana had been taking funds
from their joint account and de-
positing the money in private
bank accounts — in her name
alone — throughout the country,
Mr. Rosenberg said.
Chana and Yitzhak continued
their fight in the courts. At times,
Chana requested restraining or-
ders against her husband; she
claimed he was trying to kill her.
The judges always dismissed the
charges, Mr. Rosenberg said.
In January 1990, the couple
was still residing together in their
a
NATIONAL til
CENTER FOR
MISSING &
EXPLOITED
CHILDR EN
2101 Wilson Boulevard • Suite 550
Arlington, VA • 22201
(800) 843-5678 • (703) 235-3900
Chaya
some money and you keep the
kids," he recalled her saying. On
Oct. 18, 1988, Chana filed for di-
vorce.
According to Mr. Rosenberg,
following discussions with her at-
torneys, his wife changed her
mind about keeping Chaya and
Zelig. In the divorce proceedings,
she was awarded temporary cus-
tody.
Meanwhile, Mr. Rosenberg saw
his wife's behavior begin to take
dramatic, unexpected turns. First,
she pulled Zelig out of his yeshi-
va and placed him in a Mizrachi,
or pro-Zionist, school.
Mr. Rosenberg also received a
Zelig
home on Jill Lane in Monsey,
about 40 miles outside New York
City. Mr. Rosenberg lived down-
stairs, and his estranged wife
resided on the second floor.
That year, Chana asked the
court to evict her husband and
deny him visitation rights to
Chaya and Zelig. Yitzhak, she
said, was sexually abusing the
children.
In court, the judge asked
Chana when she learned the chil-
dren had first been abused.
Mr. Rosenberg said his wife
could not offer a sound answer.
She was "constantly changing the
date."
The judge did, however, decide
to separate the children. Yitzhak
was awarded custody of Zelig, and
Chaya went with her mother.
Yitzhak went to live tem-
porarily in Brooklyn. Chaya came
to stay with him on weekends,
and "she never wanted to go
home." Mr. Rosenberg said he re-
fused to engage in criticism of his
estranged wife. "I felt I should
never say a bad word against her,"
he said. "She was the children's
mother."
As the hearings continued,
Chana became less and less ob-
servant, Mr. Rosenberg claimed.
By August 1990, she was -telling
the court she had never been re-
ligious to begin with. Yitzhak
brought photos from the wedding
as proof to the contrary. Chana
denied it was her in the pictures.
In early October 1990, just days
after Sukkot, Chana picked up
Zelig for a visit. He and his sister
Chana have not been seen since.
M
r. Rosenberg has man-
aged to trace his wife's
journey in bits and
pieces. He knows this
much:
Soon after Chana's disappear-
ance, Budget Car and Truck
Rental at the Nanuet Mall in
Spring Valley, N.Y., just east of
Monsey, reported a missing van.
It had been rented by Chana
Rosenberg.
For five months Yitzhak knew
nothing else about the fate of his
children. Then on Memorial Day
1991, he got word that the Bud-
get van had been found at a home
in Gulfport, Miss.
Mr. Rosenberg went to Gulf-
port, but Chana and the children
were not inside the house where
the van had been discovered.
One of the last-known people
to see Chana in Mississippi was
a woman named Lydia Rayner.
Ms. Rayner is active with
MARC, the Mothers' Alliance for
the Rights of Children. She has
helped more than 50 women run-
ning from their husbands. The
women say they fear for their chil-
dren's physical and mental well-
being. Often, sexual abuse is an
issue.
About one month before leav-
ing New York, Chana began reg-
ularly calling Ms. Rayner. She
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