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SEASIDE, Oregon (CNN) -- One day in 1957, when Jeff Daly was 6 years old, his little sister, Molly, disappeared. Every night at dinner, he would ask his parents the same question, "Where's Molly?" Every night, he says, he received the same answer: "Stop asking about Molly." Decades later, Daly learned that his parents had sent Molly to a state institution nine days before her third birthday. Nearly 50 years later, Daly found his sister and made a documentary about his search. "Since the movie, literally hundreds of people have come up to us and said, 'I had a [relative] that I remember my family talking about that was sent away. Do you know how we can find out about that person?'" says Daly. Interactive: Watch Jeff Daly tell more about his and Molly's story » An increasing number of people are trying to reconnect with family members sent to live in institutions decades ago, advocates for the disabled say. ARC, a national advocacy organization for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, has created a new online family registry and search service, the FindFamily Registry, to help with such reunions. Through the registry, the ArcLink, a family services venture associated with the ARC, is compiling a database of information from family members seeking loved ones, as well as from caregivers hoping to find relatives of the people they're caring for. From that database, ArcLink staff will work to make connections. To prevent abuse, the ArcLink will carefully screen people seeking information. When a match is found, both parties will be notified. It's unknown exactly how many children were institutionalized in the last century. In 1967, at the height of institutionalization, as many as 100,000 children were housed in 162 state facilities across the U.S., according to Charlie Lakin, a professor at the University of Minnesota who studies the history of institutionalization. Other experts put the number of institutions as high as 200. Most of the people sent to institutions had some sort of developmental disability -- Down syndrome, retardation, cerebral palsy or autism, for example. Some also were sent to institutions because they were viewed as "slow." Many had other kinds of secondary disabilities, such as being in a wheelchair. In a few cases, able-bodied people also ended up in state facilities because their families could not support them financially. Watch a clip from Jeff Daly's documentary "Where's Molly?" » Conditions could be horrific, Lakin said. Residents were sometimes restrained in leather cuffs or straitjackets, overly sedated, isolated for long periods of time, and in many cases, sterilized. Many had little or no contact with their families. Read the first-person story of a mom's love for her disabled son. Such treatment was considered appropriate. Over the 19th centuries and 20th centuries, society's treatment of people with intellectual disabilities changed. From an early mission of training "productive workers" who would return to their communities, state schools for the disabled evolved into often overcrowded permanent homes, as fear and stigma colored public attitudes about people who were different. Many parents also didn't have the means or support system to keep a child with a disability at home. There was no "mainstreaming" of children with disabilities in schools. Interactive: How attitudes toward people with intellectual disabilities have changed » In the 1960s, under President John F. Kennedy, who himself had an intellectually handicapped sister, new federal laws boosted funding for resources and research on intellectual disabilities. In the 1970s, after a series of lawsuits in federal courts led to a push toward independent living for people with intellectual disabilities, the institutions began closing. Most residents were sent to smaller group homes. As difficult as it is for modern-day parents to fathom, parents sent children away under the advice of their doctors, historians say. "Back then, the standard physician message to parents with a disabled infant was, 'You can't handle this. Give the baby to the state, and don't worry about it,' " says Elbert Johns, president of ArcLink, which provides information about services and service providers and technology resources to families of the developmentally disabled. Bill Lynch, executive director of the Oregon Council on Developmental Disabilities, says it's hard to appreciate the culture of decades ago. "There was a lot of shame on the part of these families," he said. "There was such a huge stigma to disability. We're still getting over that." Many who try to reconnect do so against the wishes of the parents of the disabled child, who still feel that shame, Johns says. "There was once a motivation on the part of families to dump and forget," Johns says. "The parents made a major life decision decades ago, and now somebody's questioning that." But he said when people do reach out, "that reconnection is pretty precious." Molly's medical records indicate that she was born with a club foot and a lazy eye, which was left blind after surgery. When she was around 2, records show, doctors amended her diagnosis to "profoundly retarded," a characterization that Daly doubts but has no proof to contradict. Daly says his father tried to stay connected to Molly and visited her at Fairview, the Oregon state institution where she had gone to live. But because Molly became so upset each time he left, the staff asked him to stop coming, Daly says. Daly says his own search for Molly, which he recounts in the documentary "Where's Molly?" was relatively easy. Even though his parents wouldn't talk about Molly after she left, his father kept meticulous records. In 2004, after his parents had died, Daly found the phone number for the group home where Molly was sent after Fairview closed in 2000. "He left clues for us. He left us little bits of information that gave us the ability to find Molly," he says. "I know he wanted me to find Molly."

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) - Abuse charges were filed Wednesday against a woman accused of fraudulently adopting and mistreating 11 New York children in order to bilk a child welfare agency out of $2 million. Judith Leekin, 62, could face up to 160 years in prison if convicted on all 10 counts stemming from her alleged abuse of the children, including handcuffing them and holding them captive at her Port St. Lucie home, said prosecutor Ajay Whittemore. She was charged Wednesday with aggravated child abuse, aggravated abuse of the elderly or a disabled person, witness tampering and possession of a fictitious driver license. Whittemore said more charges were likely. "It's definitely an evolving case. More evidence is coming in on a daily basis," Whittemore said. "We've just scratched the surface on this." Leekin was jailed on more than $4 million bail. Her attorney, Mario Garcia, has said she would plead not guilty and denies the allegations. Investigators believe Leekin adopted 11 children from four separate New York City agencies using various aliases from 1993 to 1996. Port St. Lucie police say she held the children like prisoners in her home, often handcuffing them together and not allowing them to use a bathroom. The children, who now range in age from 15 to 27, told police they were never allowed to attend school, see a doctor or a dentist and were barely fed. All the victims had scars on their wrists from being handcuffed, police said. Nine were in Florida state care. Some of the adults suffered serious handicaps. One is blind and mumbles. Another can barely walk or stand. None appeared to have more than a fourth-grade education, police said. People who adopt special needs children in New York City can get as much as $55 a day until the child turns 21. Authorities say Leekin used various aliases, addresses and fraudulent documents to receive up to $2 million in subsidy payments from the New York City Administration for Children's Services. The commissioner of the New York agency, John B. Mattingly, called the allegations "abhorrent" and said his office was working to determine how Leekin came to gain custody. He noted that the agency only began fingerprinting adults who adopted children out of foster care in 1999 - after Leekin's adoptions were processed. Authorities located a 19-year-old homeless man Monday who they say was among Leekin's adopted children but left the home two years ago. Leekin continued to receive subsidy payments for him, police said. They were still searching for an 18 year old whom Leekin adopted.

OCEAN CITY, Md. (AP) - Backhoes and cadaver dogs combed the back yard of a home Monday where four infant cadavers have been found since last week. Police say the babies belong to Christy L. Freeman, 37, a taxi company owner and mother of four in this Atlantic beach town. Freeman was charged with murder in the death of one of the babies, a male fetus in the 26th week of pregnancy who was found in a vanity under a bathroom sink in Freeman's house. A preliminary report from the state medical examiner's office said the baby was stillborn. The child was discovered after Freeman went Thursday to a local hospital, where doctors found she had recently been pregnant. "There was a placenta and umbilical cord and no baby," said Ocean City Police Chief Bernadette DiPino. Police searched Freeman's home, looking for the missing fetus, and found it wrapped in a bloody white towel with a blue stripe in her bathroom. They also found, in a trunk in her bedroom, two trash bags containing what police say are human bones. After interviewing the mother, police looked in a recreational vehicle in the backyard and found remains of a fourth infant. All died before coming to term, but authorities have not said how old the three sets of remains are. Worcester County State's Attorney Joel Todd said Freeman was charged with murder under a 2005 state law authorizing murder convictions for fetuses killed after 20 weeks. Todd said investigators are still probing whether Freeman caused the babies' deaths. "We will have to prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that she did something to cause that baby to be stillborn," Todd said. DiPino declined to discuss any evidence about how the baby could have been born dead, such as whether Freeman induced an abortion. She said investigators needed to keep any such details confidential because the case was complex and in its early stages. He said he was not sure whether it is a crime to improperly dispose of a fetus that dies naturally. DiPino said all four fetuses are presumed to be the offspring of Freeman and her boyfriend, who is also father of her four living children. The boyfriend, Raymond W. Godman Jr., has not been charged, but DiPino said investigators were still interviewing him. "It's going to take us some time to develop all the facts. We are not ruling out any further suspects in this case," DiPino said. DiPino said the children were staying with Godman. Barry Neeb, a police spokesman, said, "What we need to do is collect all the evidence we can, turn that over to the grand jury and let the grand jury determine what the appropriate charges are," he said. Worcester County District Judge Daniel Mumford denied bond Monday for Freeman and set a preliminary hearing for Aug. 27. At the bail review hearing, Freeman told Mumford she was not a flight risk. "I want to clear my name in this case," Freeman said. "If you offer me a bond, I'm not going to leave ... I'm going to be here. I'm going to help clear this situation up." Her attorney, Frank Benvenuto, said Freeman had lived in Ocean City for 20 years, owns a business and has four children. Freeman is the owner of Classic Taxi in Ocean City. Outside Freeman's small, rundown white home, bulldozers cleared mounds of dirt from Freeman's backyard, while police taped off her block and erected a temporary wall to shield the investigation from onlookers. The site was behind a 7-Eleven that faces the Coastal Highway, the main north-south route in this resort town. Two cadaver dogs hit on possible scents, suggesting bodies might be buried there, DiPino said. By dusk Monday, no additional human remains had been found. Police said the ground search could take up to three days. Police described it as a "complex crime scene" and called in the FBI for help in recovering evidence. Emergency medical technicians and police were called early Thursday to Freeman's home. Godman said Freeman had passed out in the bathroom and he carried her to the sofa, according to the charging documents. She was lying down and bleeding heavily, and had a garbage bag and towels under her. Freeman told rescue workers she was not and had not been pregnant. She was taken to Atlantic General Hospital in Berlin, where tests by doctors determined she had been pregnant. Freeman maintained that was not the case, the charging documents said. After she was transferred to Peninsula Regional Medical Center in Salisbury, doctors there found a placenta and an umbilical cord with an "irregular cut." Freeman eventually told police that she had delivered a dead and deformed baby - claiming that she did not see any hands or feet - and that she had flushed the body down the toilet, charging documents said. Police said they then obtained a search warrant for the home and found the infant below the bathroom sink. The charging documents described the baby as a "viable fetus/infant," with hands, feet and facial features. Police found the two other babies' remains Thursday in Freeman's room. A search Friday of the motor home found the fourth infant's remains. Classic Taxi specializes in using cars from the 1950s and 1960s, according to the company's Web site. On the Web site, Freeman's profile said she and Godman had been a couple since 1988 and her hobbies were "our four children." She said the family were NASCAR fans and liked to fish, boat and camp together. Godman was described as a "motorhead" who, through the company, found a way to fulfill his dream of working on multiple classic cars. Paint was peeling from the couple's house and an air conditioning unit was rusting. A number of fishing poles were stored on an upstairs balcony. Neighbor Jodi Kerlin, 31, said she saw Freeman about a month ago as Freeman took out her trash and it appeared then that Freeman might have been pregnant. "The thought passed through my head," said Kerlin, who recently gave birth. "I passed it off." Neeb said the bodies were sent to the office of the chief medical examiner in Baltimore to determine the causes of death, their ages and when they died. Investigators will also conduct DNA tests to determine whether the babies were Freeman's, Neeb said. Ron Cecil, 71, the owner of Aaron Taxi, met Freeman through the town's taxi association and said he saw her driving a cab several weeks ago. He said she was short and chunky and wore sweatshirts. The charging documents described Freeman as 5 feet, 8 inches tall, and weighing 180 pounds. "She could have easily been pregnant and it not have been known," Cecil said. Former employee Mike Larrimore said Freeman's older children were two teenage girls, an 11-year-old boy and a younger boy he hadn't met. He said he worked at Classic Taxi from March until the first week of June, when he quit, and had no idea Freeman was pregnant. "That fascinated me - nobody seemed to know," Larrimore said. "There was never any talk of being pregnant or anything like that." Associated Press writers Ben Greene in Baltimore, Brian Witte in Annapolis and Ocean City, Md., and Kristen Wyatt in Ocean City contributed to this story.