Little Tillie Craig disappeared from the ‘Ministry of God’ farm in New South Wales, Australia in 1987, sparking a nearly four-decade search by her father, who was told she was adopted.

In reality, only 2-year-old Tilly had been killed by her then 25-year-old mother, Helen Rachel Craig, with whom the little girl lived in the sect’s convent.

Helen was expelled from the sect and evaded arrest until 2021 when the authorities tracked her down to her parents’ home in New Zealand. She was brought to trial and finally today a Sydney court sentenced her to 9 years in prison, with the possibility of parole after six years in custody in November 2027.

The judge accepted that Craig had not intended to cause Tilly serious harm, but said “to call her death a tragedy would be a gross understatement”.

“She died at the hands of someone whose role it was to protect her,” the judge said.

In a letter read to the court, the woman apologized for her crime, claiming “something happened to her” as a mother on the farm.

“My actions were horrible, horrible, horrible.” “I will never forgive myself for what I have done,” she wrote, adding that she wanted “justice” for her daughter and was “reconciled” with her imprisonment.

The chief cremated the little girl and scattered her ashes

Helen beat her two-year-old daughter to death with a plastic pipe for not wiping properly. He didn’t actually want to kill her – children in the cult community had to do chores, regardless of age, and were often punished with a piece of black plastic pipe.

But when he found that little Tilly was no longer breathing, he put her body in the bathtub and called the sect leader Alexander Wilon – or “Papa” (Father) – to come back.

After praying for the girl’s resurrection, Wilon is accused of cremating Tilly, scattering her ashes and forbidding sect members to talk about what happened.

Wilon was charged at trial with being an accessory and abettor to Tilly’s murder – and later on separate charges of sexual assault – but the terminally ill man has since been found unfit to stand trial.