50 Year Old Cold Case Heats Up

The details surrounding the disappearance of four-year old Daniel Barter 50 years ago have been washed away by time. In the summer of 1959, Barter and his family were enjoying a camping and fishing trip near Perdido Bay when the little boy went for a walk in the woods...and vanished.

Five decades later, the cold case is heating up. Tuesday night, the hit CBS series "Without a Trace" featured the Barter case which could jump-start a new investigation.

"I don't know why they haven't found any remains," says Foley insurance agent Charlie Hebert. Hebert was Baldwin County's Civil Defense Director in 1959 and remembers organizing a search for the little boy. "The military went in the woods hand-in-hand through the woods. It was very dense undergrowth."

Hebert hopes investigators will find answers.

"No, I don't think he's alive. I think he was either picked up by people that came through there or was eaten by alligators," says Hebert.

But Hebert says finding closure could be difficult.

The Baldwin County Sheriff's Office and the FBI are investigating. Detectives are offering a five-thousand dollar reward in the Barter case.