AURORA, Ill. (AP) — Police in the Chicago suburb of Aurora said Wednesday afternoon that the department is sending two detectives to the Cincinnati area to investigate a missing child report that could involve an Illinois boy who disappeared in 2011.
The department knows there is a boy involved but they don't know who he is or if he has any connection to Timmothy Pitzen, Aurora Police Sgt. Bill Rowley said. Pitzen was 6 years old in 2011 when he disappeared after authorities said his mother took her own life.
According to WCPO, "The boy told Campbell County, Kentucky, authorities that he is 14-year-old Timmothy Pitzen, and that two kidnappers had been holding him for seven years, according to a Sharonville, Ohio, police report. He told authorities that he escaped and kept running."
Police believe Amy Fry-Pitzen, 43, picked up her son from school and took him to the zoo and a Wisconsin water park before she apparently killed herself. Her body was found with her wrists slit in a Rockford hotel on May 15, 2011.
"Pitzen disappeared ten years ago and we've probably had thousands of tips of him popping up in different areas," Rowley said. "We have no idea what we're driving down there for. It could be Pitzen. It could be a hoax."
The FBI said in a Wednesday afternoon statement that its offices in Louisville and Cincinnati were working on a missing child investigation with Aurora police and police departments in Cincinnati and Newport, Kentucky, and the Hamilton County Sheriff's Office in Ohio. The FBI offered no other details.
The FBI has not confirmed a link to the Pitzen case and said they're conducting a DNA test to identify the child. Aurora police said the DNA tests will take about 24 hours.
Timmothy Pitzen's grandmother, Alana Anderson, told WISN-TV Wednesday that authorities have told the family very little.
"We just know a 14-year-old boy was found and went to the police," Anderson said. "We don't want to get our hopes up and our family's hopes up until we know something. We just don't want to get our hopes up. We've had false reports and false hopes before."
