On New Year’s Day, every news heading said the same thing: Lilith Connelly, America’s gothic sweetheart and pop star sensation, vanished just as the year ended.


In most cases, a celebrity going missing was typically a cause for concern. Search parties, constant news coverage, social media outlets running wild with theories of what happened, the works. The problem in the case of Lilith, however, was that she didn’t simply just go missing. The tabloids and online news articles were very particular in their phrasing of the phenomenon with Lilith Connelly.


It was New Year’s Eve, and Lilith was set to perform during the ball drop in Times Square as the last act, right before the pivotal moment of the ball’s descent. As some articles would write following her vanishing, Lilith Connelly was probably the reason most people made the trip to New York City for the ball drop to begin with. In her many years on the rise as America’s next pop sensation that would rival the fame and fortune of those who came before her, she had yet to grace the stage as a performer for the New Year’s Eve party; of course, this also meant that there were that many more eyes to have witnessed the phenomenon that happened that night firsthand.


Valencia Ruiz, known online for her blog The Valencia Effect, covers the lives and careers of pop culture icons like Lilith, and was been one of the first blogs to cover the phenomenon. Some argue that she was the first to witness the phenomenon in the first place, having been five feet from the main stage when Lilith Connelly vanished right before her very eyes. She had taken video of the moment that it had happened, making what was originally supposed to be a fun video for The Valencia Effect into undeniable evidence for a high priority missing persons case.


Or, at least, it was supposed to be undeniable evidence. After her phone had been confiscated by the police for further investigation into the disappearance of Lilith, it was the officers of the Midtown South Precinct that made the discovery that Lilith Connelly’s disappearance was not what it was supposed to have been. Due to this discovery, Valencia Ruiz’s video has not been released to the public.


A short recap of the contents of Valencia’s video (now dubbed “The Ruiz Video” in online circles) are as follows, according to Commanding Officer Edward Maven III, the only officer from the precinct to speak on the disappearance of Lilith Connelly thus far:


— Lilith Connelly was performing her latest single from her upcoming album, “Touch Me Like You Want Me”, at 11:58:47 on the night of December 31 in Times Square in New York City.

— Due to the proximity of Valencia Ruiz to the stage, the video slightly obscures most of the stage around Connelly, consequentially obscuring any potential persons of interest related to the case.

— Other video evidence from the performance, such as the television broadcast, show three other individuals actively on stage near Connelly at the time of her disappearance. These individuals are her backup dancers, identified as Zoey Anthony, Nathan Mitchell Jr, and Edith Latimer.

— At 11:59:13, “Touch Me Like You Want Me” ends and Connelly and her backup dancers all hold for applause. Unlike the television broadcast, which focuses on the wider audience in Times Square, Ruiz’s video shows that Connelly looks abnormally nervous and upset.

— At 11:59:15, Anthony, Mitchell, and Latimer exit stage right as the television broadcast’s host enters from stage left, talking to the broadcast about Connelly’s performance. Connelly continues to appear nervous and upset as the host approaches her.

— At 11:59:20, Connelly is interviewed by the television broadcast’s host about her first time performing for the show. Connelly is still visibly nervous but laughs it off as “just nerves” for the new year when questioned by the host.

— At 11:59:40, the host brings up that they are twenty seconds from the new year. Connelly does not respond to or move away from the host.

— At 11:59:50, the host begins the countdown. Connelly does not react to or move away from the host.

— At 11:59:59, Connelly begins to scream and cry while holding her head, crouching down into a fetal position and seemingly in a gratuitous amount of pain. This was not caught by the television broadcast, as it was focused on the ball drop, but was caught by Ruiz’s video. Ruiz can be heard in her video, but due to the phone’s microphone quality and the other noises happening at the same time, it is unintelligible what she is saying.

— At 12:00:00, the television broadcast focuses again on the host and Connelly. The host begins to ask a question for Connelly before realizing that she is not there anymore. He brushes it off to the television broadcast, but he is visibly nervous and confused.

 

Following the end of the countdown, as the broadcast moved on to show Nashville, Tennessee for Central Standard time zones’ countdown, audience members within one hundred yards of the main stage at Times Square were escorted out by the New York Police Department. According to reports by various trustworthy local news sources, over one thousand people were questioned about the whereabouts of Lilith Connelly. Other than Valencia Ruiz and the video she took, NYPD has yet to find any leads as to what happened to Connelly and where she is now.


Ruiz’s video is the only known instance of the phenomenon being caught on camera, and it has now become considered “lost media” in true crime, paranormal, and other related subsections of the internet. To be able to see what happened to Lilith Connelly in her last moments on stage during the ball drop and find the truth as to what Officer Maven’s reports of the video’s contents have left out are questions that can only be solved by watching The Ruiz Video. Theories and speculation around what happened to Connelly are, of course, out there, but so is the cold hard truth.


We here at Lurkin’ Larks are nothing if not truth seekers. To seek the truth of the case of Lilith Connelly, we need the help of the community around us. You all were so helpful when we were discussing many similar cases, such as the kidnapping of the Brantley sisters, and once again we are turning to you all for help. If you know anything about what happened to Lilith Connelly at 11:59:59 on New Year’s Eve, please reach out to us either through this post’s comment section or through the business email/contact form found in the “About The Larks” section of this website.


Stay safe, stay vigilant, stay lurkin’.

Signed, Drew

 

[NOTE: THE FOLLOWING ARE SELECTED COMMENTS UNDER THE ABOVE BLOG POST, TITLED “WHAT HAPPENED TO LILITH CONNELLY?” FROM THE LURKIN’ LARKS BLOG.]

 

ALICE D. SAID: hope you guys can get any info about the ruiz video soon! i have loved lilith and her music since her EP back in 2013, so sad that nobody knows what happened to her. praying she gets back safe to her family soon!!

 

JOHN P. SAID: I say good riddance, nobody needs that techno-infused goth pop shit she was putting out. This is probably a publicity stunt to make her go viral before her next album and you Larks are just feeding into it. [NOTE: COMMENT WAS DELETED AND USER WAS BANNED SHORTLY AFTER COMMENT WAS POSTED.]

 

MARY-MARGARET S. SAID: Hello Drusilla, I am Mary-Margaret Scott. I am contacting you to tell you that my husband, Officer Will Scott, has information pertaining to the video taken from Valencia Ruiz on New Year’s Eve. Please contact him at [EMAIL REDACTED] or [PHONE NUMBER REDACTED]. Thank you, M.M. Scott.

DREW L. REPLIED: Thank you so much for commenting, Mrs Scott! We will be in contact with your husband soon for more information.