El miércoles 11 de mayo del 2011, hace diez años ya de aquel día, Jim Pitzen llevó en su auto a su hijo a la escuela primaria Greenman, en la ciudad de Aurora, en el estado de Illinois, Estados Unidos.
Al llegar, Timmothy de 6 años, le dijo como siempre “Papá te amo", dibujó con sus labios una sonrisa y se bajó del vehículo corriendo.The last thing Jim saw him was the spider -man who had stamped on the backpack that hung from his back.He stayed for a few seconds waiting for him to enter school safe and except...He turned back in the parking lot and left.
Mom's surprise
Less than an hour after that scene, between 8.10 and 8.15, la madre de Timmothy, Amy Fry Pitzen, de 42 años, cayó a buscarlo de sorpresa al colegio. Le dijo a la maestra que tenía que retirar a su hijo por una emergencia familiar.
En las cámaras de vigilancia de la escuela primaria se ve a Timmothy correr hacia su madre, con la mochila puesta, y darle la mano.Then, they are observed to cross the colorful floors lobby and go out the main door.Timmothy was wearing blue shorts, a brown shirt, white socks and dark shoes.
They went up to the truck and Amy handled almost 50 kilometers to a mechanical workshop where he left his Ford Expedition for a routine review. Para no quedarse esperando ahí le preguntó al empleado del lugar si podía llevarlos hasta el zoológico de Brookfield, ellos después volverían por sus medios.That way, Timmothy wouldn't get bored so much.The employee told him yes and reached them to the place.
There, mother and son, they walked happily for several hours and returned to look for the car at 15.
The paths of Amy
When that afternoon Jim went to look for Timmothy at school he got a surprise: they told him that his wife had retired him very early that morning.The first thing he did was score Amy's cell phone, but she didn't answer.He left several messages that were straight to the voicemail.Also called Amy's work.They didn't know anything about her.I was confused...What was happening?He had had breakfast with Amy that morning, everything seemed good and there was no family emergency.Not knowing what to do, Jim returned home.
Hacía un tiempo Amy había pasado por una depresión y la pareja enfrentaba algunas dificultades en su matrimonio.Once he had been surprisingly absent from the home, but he hadn't taken his son.Jim began calling all relatives.Nobody knew anything.They would come back, he thought.His relatives believed the same.
On the other hand, after removing the truck, Amy set out to drive again.He went to Gurnee, about 72 kilometers from where they were. Se registraron en un resort que cuenta con un parque acuático, llamado en ese entonces Keylime Cove (hoy su nombre es Great Wolf Lodge).The next morning, Thursday, May 12, they got up, had breakfast and left for Wisconsin Dells, in the state of Wisconsin.There were 272 kilometers.On the way they stopped to buy clothes, a toy car and a game to assemble for Timmothy.On the 94 Interstate Highway they stopped loading gasoline and drinking drinks.Both made the check in at the Kalahari Resort. Este hotel también tenía parque acuático, cine y pistas de bowling.Ideal for guys!It seemed like a getaway to enjoy.
Mientras, en la casa familiar reinaba el desconcierto.On Thursday 12, seeing that they didn't come back, Jim decided not to wait any longer and called the police. Denunció la desaparición de su hijo y de su mujer. El nombre de Timmothy fue incluido en la base nacional de chicos desaparecidos, pero no se activó la alerta Amber porque estaba con su madre y no se creía que su vida estuviera realmente en peligro.
On Friday, May 13, Amy and his son repeated the same scheme: they got up, had breakfast and left at 10.10.The hotel cameras show them hand in hand and, at one time, it is seen that Timmothy checks something inside their backpack that has its mother hanging.They got into the car and Amy took a route south by interstate 39 and then joined another west highway to the city of Sterling.
It was that noon, between 12 and 13.30, que Amy comenzó a devolver las llamadas de sus familiares.She had her husband's messy phone and all her worried relatives.Amy did not deign to call Jim, although she did spoke with her brother -in. Una sola frase resuena todavía en la cabeza de él: “Timmothy me pertenece", dijo Amy en un momento. También llamó a su madre, Alana Anderson, para decirle que estaban bien, que solo necesitaba estar un día o dos tranquila con su hijo.The conversation seemed normal.The mobile phone records indicated that at the time of that call it was northwest of Sterling, near Route 40. La abuela, mientras hablaba con Amy, oyó a su nieto decir que tenía hambre.It was the last time someone heard Timmothy's voice.
Amy's brother -in -law and mother called him to reassure him, they seemed good to be.
After those calls, Amy and Timmothy trail turns strange.She moves away from the main routes and takes secondary roads where there are no installed cameras.There will be no more images with your child.
Almost six hours later, at 19.25, the security videos of a Dollar store, in the town of Winnebago, record it alone. Amy entra a comprar una lapicera, un sobre y papel de carta.At 20, another camcorder sample in Sullivan ‘s food.At 23.15 is recorded at the Rockford Inn hotel, in Rockford City. Timmothy no está con ella.
What happened in those hours of which there is no record?Nobody knows.
A desperate finding
On Saturday, May 14, at 12.30th of noon, a maid from the Rockford Inn hotel entered the room. La escena que encontró fue de terror: Amy se había suicidado cortándose las muñecas.After the forensic analysis, the experts would confirm that in their body there were high doses of antihistamines.
The establishment called the police.The agents who arrived at the place found in the room the weapon that Amy had used.The Timmothy personal identification card was also there.
Se había suicidado, eso estaba claro, porque había dejado una carta.In his note, who seemed addressed to Jim, he assured that his son was “with people who love him and will worry about him...you will never find".Where was Timmothy?That was the great unknown.Nor did they find Amy's cell phone or the clothes she had been put on according to the video when she went to school to look for it: some brown pants, a white shirt and sandals.
Police recovered Amy's truck at the hotel parking lot and took her to search for clues.The remains on the wheels could indicate where it had been before committing suicide.
A counterreloj's search for the child began.
Prelude to a drama
Timmothy James was born on October 18, 2004, in the city of Aurora.For Amy Joan Marie Fry her marriage to Jim Pitzen was the fourth attempt to form a stable couple and Timmothy was her first child.That the name wore two mm was something unusual, but Amy wanted her son to be "special," he said.
He had suffered depressions in the past, but was medicated and seemed to have evolved well.To her previous partner, many years ago, she had threatened to kill herself after a discussion.He had stopped the car on the tracks of a train as he assured that he was going to let the railroad hit her.A while later, he gave up the attempt and let them take her to a psychiatric hospital where he spent hospitalized a week.They prescribed antidepressants and returned home.Anyway, that marriage was shipwrecked.
Jim and Amy met at a friends party a couple of years before. En el año 2003, según relató Jim a la CNN ella “tomó pastillas y estuvo sentada en el borde de un acantilado.It is supposed to be passed out and fell...".It is not well known, but the fact would not have had major physical consequences. Al año siguiente Amy quedó embarazada.For Jim, who had just overcome an Hodgkin lymphoma, it was an extra joy to be a father. Decidieron casarse antes del nacimiento del bebé.
Jim assured the researchers that Amy enjoyed being a mother and that she was completely dedicated to the little.I worshiped him. Aunque debió reconocer que la pareja no andaba del todo bien, habían estado discutiendo bastante.Above all, after Amy had gone to celebrate her birthday to a cruise with a friend and without him.Before Jim's claim, Amy mentioned the possibility of separating, but then reversing and never talked about a divorce.They believe he had terror of losing Timmothy's custody.He was convinced that by his mental problems the judge would be granted, without hesitation, Jim.
Theories and truths
The researchers spoke with Jim with absolute frankness. Le preguntaron si creía que Amy podía haber asesinado a su hijo. Él dijo rotundamente que no.The same repeated friends and family. Lo quería demasiado.But we already know that excess love can be a weapon with two edges.
At first, when they reviewed the purchases Amy had made with their credit card, the detectives were optimistic.At 11.15 of Thursday 12 had acquired clothes and toys in the Racine store, in Wisconsin.Those things were not found in the hotel or in the Ford Expedition truck.Nor was the backpack with the stamp of Timmothy's spider -man.They thought that the mother could have left the child with other people and their belongings.
La búsqueda se intensificó, pero al mismo tiempo los peritos criminalistas hallaron en el auto abundante sangre del menor.Alarms sounded. Estas fueron desactivadas por la misma familia que contó que hacía muy poco tiempo, Timmothy, había tenido una fuerte hemorragia nasal dentro del auto.
The vehicle's wheels were examined and they could determine that he had been parked in a grass area, near a water channel because he had a lot of mud.That did tense, again, the investigation.
The children's seat was not inside the car.Maybe Amy would have given it to those who had Timmothy?Hope lasted little: the seat appeared at home.Amy had gone on a trip without him...Which showed that he was not too worried about the security of his son.
A massive search began with researchers from Illinois, Wisconsin and Iowa. El tiempo apremiaba.
Amy's last phone calls came from somewhere near Sterling.They started the search in that place. Tapizaron la ciudad con fotos del niño y se aseguraron que los habitantes estuvieran al tanto del caso para que pudiesen colaborar con nuevas pistas.
If Amy had left it with someone there was no way that someone did not know about the great search. Por su lado, Jim habló con los medios y suplicó por su aparición. En su casa, cada vez que sonaba el teléfono, era una tortura.The illusions that they had found always ended in a deep disappointment.
The days became weeks, weeks in months and months in years.There were less and less hope that I was alive.A true agony for Jim.
Los investigadores no pudieron encontrar ninguna conexión entre Amy y la zona de Sterling donde los rastros del pequeño se diluían.Why had it gone there?Amy's email account and financial statements were reviewed with the idea of finding new clues.There was nothing. Por la cuenta que tenía Amy de peajes pudieron reconstruir que había hecho dos viajes a la zona de Sterling en los meses previos: el 18 de febrero y el 20 de marzo.That was a surprise because nobody in the family knew it.Every time he went to the place he was between four and five hours.Whether it was that he had done, he was not improvised. Parecía algo bien planeado.
Had he left him with someone?Had he killed and hidden his body?What had Timmothy lived that afternoon?
The questions were on the table, but they never found something that indicated what really happened.The area is immense and the lack of cameras did not help even if they toured it with special equipment.
Dos años después, en 2013, una mujer alcanzó a la policía un celular que había hallado dos años antes cerca de la ruta. Resultó ser el celular de Amy.Incredibly that woman had never associated that phone to the Pitzen case.I had left it in a drawer until a brother of his needed a new cell phone.He remembered to have it, offered it to him, charged it and set it.There he jumped ... He barely looked at the scheduled contacts saw those names that had flooded the news.He took him to the police and the apparatus was permitted, but did not contribute any evidence.
An encouraging track
On April 3, 2019, the case left freezer and briefly reheated. Unos vecinos Newport, en el estado de Kentucky, llamaron a la policía para denunciar que un adolescente sucio y desaliñado vagaba por las calles.
When the police went to see what was happening he found a distressed young man.That boy told them that it was Timmothy Pitzen and that he was 14 years old.He assured that he had escaped two men who had kidnapped him and locked up for years at a hotel in the Red Roof Inn chain, in the Cincinnati area.According to their own description, the men had the context of some bodybuilders and carried spiders and snakes in the body tattooed.Police hesitated his story, but he ordered a DNA test any.
Después de ocho años sin novedades, la noticia estalló en los medios.Twenty -four hours later were the results.That young man was not 14 years old and 23 and was called Michael Brian Rini.He was a convict from Ohio, who had left Belmont's institution less than a month before, after serving fourteen months of theft and vandalism.
The story that Timmothy could be collapsed.Jim this refloated his deep anguish.Those who followed the case thought that perhaps this media coverage would boost the appearance of clues or data.They were wrong, the case stagnated again.
Ten years without your child
Aunque Jim sigue creyendo que Timmothy está vivo en algún lado, los detectives tienen cada vez menos esperanzas.The National Center for missing and exploited children makes new progressions of its image that reflect how the teenager could see today. La ilusión es que alguien lo reconozca y lo comunique a las autoridades.
La tía, Karla Jacobs, declaró “sabemos que Tim -por Timothy- debe estar en algún lugar... no vamos a parar de buscarlo, de quererlo y de rezar por él".The authorities also went out to notice that they will not forget the little. Alana, la madre de Amy, por su parte, admitió en una entrevista que trata de perdonar a su hija por lo que se hizo a sí misma, pero “tengo problemas para perdonarla por que que le hizo a su hijo".
Jim, quien se mudó de Aurora a su ciudad de origen, Clinton, en Iowa, hoy con 50 años, insiste e implora a la gente que preste atención: “Está por ahí, en algún lugar.They are not afraid to tell us if they have seen it.It can be sitting right next to you and not knowing it (...) Sé que es una cuestión de tiempo que nos volvamos a encontrar".
In a report that gave People magazine in 2015, he said that his son woke up every day at 5.30, that it was not a stub on bed, and that every day he gets up thinking that he is another one without Timmothy.In the interview he wonders: “I always question what she would say to Timmothy ... Why didn't he try to call me?We had taught him how to call 911 emergencies ... We had told him: ‘This is your mother's phone, this is your phone, this is your address ... '.How typical we do parents (...) He is not with his mother, he is not with his father. ¿Con quiénes está?".
También le dijo a People: “La depresión es una enfermedad.It is to be treated.Cannot be ignored.I forgive her, but it will take me a lot to overcome it ... It has insumed me a lot of therapy to be able to cross the day to day. Aprender que no ha sido mi culpa; que ella lo planeó durante un tiempo…"
10 years of their forced absence have already been completed.If I were alive, Timmothy Pitzen would have 16 and study the secondary.Maybe thinking about that is to feed a vain hope.Fear, which flies under their bass and nobody puts in words, is that on Friday 13 his mother has taken away that wonderful life that he had granted him so much.
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