In 1963, George Carroll went out for a pack of cigarettes and never returned to his Long Island home.
At least, that's what his four children were told. But there were always questions. For instance, if he'd left the family, why was his car still in the driveway? Eventually, Carroll's children began to search and dig for answers. Then in 2018 they made a shocking discovery - their father was buried in the basement.
The family's journey and quest for answers will be chronicled in the upcoming documentary The Secrets We Bury, premiering on ID and streaming on HBO Max on December 16.
"It is rare to see people love each other so well through such dark, terrible circumstances," the film's director Patricia E. Gillespie told PEOPLE.
Carroll's wife, Dorothy, died in 1998 and took any secrets she had regarding her husband's death and how he ended up buried in the basement with her, PEOPLE reported.
The outlet reported that over the years, when the kids asked about their dad, Dorothy dismissed the questions.
The family had a live-in handyman named Richard Darress whom Dorothy married after George disappeared. PEOPLE reported that the marriage was not a good one and ended in divorce. The Carroll kids told PEOPLE that Darress was abusive.
"Our father was in the ground for 55 years while we just thought he abandoned us," George's eldest son Steven Carroll, 68 told PEOPLE. "But somebody murdered him."
