Sylvia Likens Memorial
Near Indianapolis, Indiana
This marker in Indianapolis stands in memory of Sylvia Likens, a sixteen-year-old girl who died in October nineteen sixty-five after months of extreme abuse in a home on East New York Street. Sylvia and her sister had been left in the care of a neighbor, Gertrude Baniszewski, while their parents worked a traveling carnival circuit. What followed became one of the most disturbing criminal cases in Indiana history.
Baniszewski and several neighborhood children subjected Sylvia to prolonged torture. Her death prompted new Indiana laws on child abuse and neglect reporting, and it became a landmark case for child welfare reform. The Indianapolis Police Department placed this memorial as a commitment to protecting children.
Sylvia Likens was buried in Lebanon, Indiana. She was remembered by those who worked to ensure her death would not be forgotten.
