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To get this episode of Forensic Tales ad-free, please visit patreon.com slash Forensic Tales. Forensic Tales discusses topics that some listeners may find disturbing. The contents of this episode may not be suitable for everyone. Listener discretion is advised. On May 11th, 2011, Amy picks her son up from school in the middle of the day. Six-year-old Timothy is having the time of his life. The pair travel across the states to zoos and water parks.
At the end of the school day, Timothy's father goes to the elementary school to pick his son up. But Timothy isn't there. The school reports his mom picked him up on a family emergency. Timothy is never seen or heard from again. This is Forensic Tales, episode number 153, The Disappearance of Timothy Pitson.
Welcome to Forensic Tales. I'm your host, Courtney Fretwell-Ariola.
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On the morning of May 11, 2011, James Pitson, his wife Amy, and their six-year-old son Timothy left their house in Aurora, Illinois, a city 40 miles west of Chicago and once referred to as the best place to live the American dream.
Amy offered to drive six-year-old Timothy to school, but James was concerned about her driving. The previous night, Amy complained about a terrible episode of vertigo. So instead, James offered to drive Timothy to kindergarten, then afterward, he would drop Amy off at her job.
All three members of the Pitson family left the house together that morning. The first to be dropped off was six-year-old Timothy. James dropped him off for kindergarten at Greenman Elementary School in Aurora. Timothy hopped out of the car wearing his Spider-Man backpack. And before going into the school, Timothy turned around and said bye to his dad, who told him he loved him and to be good at school that day.
After dropping Timothy off at Greenman Elementary, James drove three blocks away and dropped his wife Amy off at work. 43-year-old Amy Pitson worked right down the street from Timothy's kindergarten at a real estate company. After James dropped Amy off at work, he drove to work himself. James Pitson had no idea that that would be the last time he saw his wife and six-year-old son.
Later that afternoon, James returned to Greenman Elementary to pick Timothy up for the day. But when he got to the school, the administrators told him that Timothy wasn't there. Instead, they said his mom, Amy, had signed him out of school a few hours earlier around 8.30. Amy told the school that there was a family emergency and she needed to pull Timothy out of school for the rest of the day.
When James checked the school's log, he saw that Amy's signature had signed him out of school that day. The only problem was, James didn't know about any family emergency. As soon as James walked out of the school, he tried calling Amy's cell phone to find out what was happening, but she didn't pick up. He then drove straight to their house, but they weren't there either.
Over the next several hours, James repeatedly called Amy's cell phone, but she either didn't answer or it went straight to voicemail. By the evening, James still hadn't heard from Amy, so he called her sister. But she had no idea where Amy was. If she went somewhere, she left without saying. And when she tried calling Amy's cell phone, it went straight to voicemail.
James went to bed that night without hearing from his wife Amy or their six-year-old son for over 12 hours. The last time anyone heard or saw them was at Timothy's school around 8.30 a.m., but instead of calling the police, he decided to go to bed. This event wasn't entirely out of character for Amy. When she got upset with James, she sometimes took off for a couple of hours, sometimes even longer.
She would usually take the car and drive somewhere to calm down and clear her mind. But this time was different because this time she took Timothy with her. If she left for a few hours, she always went by herself. But James just figured they would show up the following morning and eventually everything would be fine. But he was wrong. Amy and Timothy were still missing by the next day, Thursday, May 12th.
On Thursday, May 12th, James contacted the Aurora Police Department to report his wife and son missing. At this point, it had been over 24 hours since Amy picked Timothy up at kindergarten. But the police didn't seem too concerned. Instead, they asked why he was so worried. And James said this was very unusual for Amy. He said his wife checked their son out of school, saying that there was a family emergency that he knew nothing about.
And according to James, they didn't take anything with them. No clothes, no toys, nothing. He was also worried because Amy hadn't taken her daily medications with her. Two full bottles sat on the bathroom counter untouched. So to be gone for over 24 hours without packing a bag or bringing her prescription medication was strange.
24 hours after James contacted the police and almost 48 hours after Amy and Timothy were last seen, someone finally heard from Amy. But it wasn't James. On Friday, May 13th, Amy used her cell phone and made two phone calls. Her first phone call was to her mother. Amy told her mom that everything was fine and that she and Timothy would be home in a day or two.
There was nothing about this phone call that seemed off. After Amy spoke with her mother, she made a second phone call. But again, it wasn't to her husband. Instead, Amy called her husband's brother, her brother-in-law. On the phone call, Amy told her brother-in-law the same thing she told her mom. She assured him that everything was fine and she just needed a few days away from the house.
On both of these phone calls, six-year-old Timothy can be heard in the background. And like Amy said, everything was fine. But there was one thing that stood out about this phone call. And it was how Amy talked about six-year-old Timothy. While talking to her brother-in-law, Amy referred to Timothy as hers. Not her and James' son, just hers.
She said things like, After the phone calls, Amy's husband and family assumed they would be home any minute. If it wasn't on Friday, May 13th, it would be Saturday the next day. But that didn't happen. Amy and Timothy never came home.
On Saturday, May 14th, 72 hours after Amy and Timothy were last seen, police knocked on James' front door, but the news wasn't good. They said Amy was found dead 80 miles away inside a Rockford, Illinois motel. The police said they found Amy dead from an apparent suicide, but Timothy wasn't with her. Inside the motel, they found an empty bottle of antihistamines and a lot of blood.
Amy had killed herself by overdosing on a bottle of antihistamines and cutting her wrist and neck. Blood was found throughout the motel, suggesting that she had moved around while bleeding. Blood was found in the bathtub. Spatter was even on the walls and floors. Underneath her body, they found the knife she used. But what the police found inside the motel was just as important as what they didn't find.
Hotel surveillance cameras captured Amy arriving at the Rockford Motel on Friday night, May 13th. But Timothy wasn't with her. She was completely alone. What was also missing from the motel room was Timothy's Spider-Man backpack, Amy's cell phone, and the clothing she had been wearing when she picked him up from school. Brown capri pants, a white or light pink shirt, and sandals.
Next to Amy's body, there was a suicide note. Not only did the letter offer a possible explanation for her suicide, but it also provided a hint as to where Timothy might be. In the letter, she said that Timothy was safe and that he was with other people who would care for him. She also added, you will never find him. According to Amy's family and James, she suffered from serious depression most of her adult life.
She had been taking antidepressant medication for years and had at least two previous attempts at suicide. The first attempt happened before she met James. She had parked her car across train tracks but reconsidered at the last minute. Another time, she had taken a handful of sleeping pills while she sat in a car alongside the road. Fortunately, someone spotted her car and called the police.
She was taken to the hospital and she eventually checked into a mental health facility. Only days after Amy's suicide inside that Rockford motel, a second suicide letter appeared. This time the letter arrived in Amy's mother's mailbox. The second suicide note was similar to the one left behind in the motel. Amy explained to her mother that she tried to live with her depression but simply couldn't go on.
She also said she took Timothy somewhere safe, a place where he will be well taken care of. But like the first note, Amy said they will never find Timothy. Immediately following Amy's suicide, the search for missing six-year-old Timothy intensified. No one knew where he was or who he was with. There were so many unanswered questions. But Amy's husband and family were convinced of one thing.
Amy might have been depressed and suicidal, but she wouldn't have harmed her son. By all accounts, Amy did everything for him, and she absolutely adored him. Amy and James Pitson met at a party in late 2002. It was a going-away party for her in Ames, Iowa. Amy had worked in Ames since she graduated from Iowa State University but was moving to Illinois.
James had recently moved to Iowa for a job and a friend had asked him if he wanted to go to a party. After the party, James asked Amy out on a date. From the moment they met, Amy and James hit it off. Despite having very different personalities, they seemed to complement each other. Amy found out she was pregnant about a year after they started dating.
The pregnancy was a surprise to both of them because they didn't think they could have kids. James battled a case of Hodgkin's lymphoma when he was 20 and thought that cancer had left him unable to have kids. So when Amy got pregnant, they thought it was a miracle. Although she never thought about having kids and she feared that she would pass along her depression, she knew this pregnancy was meant to be.
As soon as they found out they were pregnant, they decided to get married. They had a small ceremony in May of 2004 while Amy was about four months pregnant. This was James' first marriage, but for Amy, it was her fourth. When Timothy was born, Amy's life turned completely upside down in the best way possible. She took to motherhood easily for someone who never thought about having children.
Those who knew her said that she loved Timothy and they were always together. By all accounts, she was a great mom. So when James and the family found out Amy killed herself, they knew she wouldn't have done anything to Timothy. But where was he? And what did she mean when she wrote that no one would ever find him?
Before Amy pulled Timothy out of school on May 11, 2011, she and James had problems. James, 39, and Amy, 43, were fighting in the weeks leading up to that tragic day. Although they fought a lot during their seven-year marriage, things in May of 2011 seemed especially dire. Amy and James fought over almost everything. They were in a relationship that was not easy.
Sometimes they fought over small things like what James did or didn't do, but other times the fights were about things much bigger. In 2008, they almost divorced after James found out that Amy was talking to her ex-husband. The two reconciled when Amy agreed she wouldn't communicate with her ex. And for a while, things seemed to be okay in their relationship.
But trouble started up again a few weeks before Amy's suicide. James thought it was simply another bout of depression. He had been through this with Amy so many times over the years. But this time was different. Support for this episode comes from The Foggy Dog. If you're looking for the perfect holiday gift for the pup who has it all, The Foggy Dog now offers personalization to make your gift even more special.
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What are some of your self-care non-negotiables? Maybe you never skip leg day or therapy day. When your schedule is packed with kids' activities, big work projects, or podcasting like me, it's easy to let your priorities slip. Even when we know it makes us feel good, it's hard to make time for it. But when you feel like you have no time for yourself, non-negotiables like therapy are more important than ever.
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Never skip therapy day with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash tails to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash tails. Colorado police quickly got to work piecing together a timeline of Amy and Timothy's last known whereabouts leading up to the suicide.
They knew there was a 72-hour window between when Amy pulled Timothy out of school on Wednesday, May 11th, and when she arrived at the motel on Friday, May 13th. They used cell phone data, surveillance video, and freeway records to construct a timeline of their movements. What they discovered was disturbing. Detectives pieced together a 500-mile journey that Amy took Timothy on.
The journey stretched across six counties and two states, Illinois and Wisconsin. It included stops at two separate water parks and a zoo. Surveillance cameras at Timothy's kindergarten in Aurora captured Amy arriving at the school at 8.15 a.m. She was seen pulling up to Timothy's school in her car, a blue 2004 Ford Expedition that she had left parked at her job.
About 20 minutes later, she's seen walking out with Timothy. According to the school, she said she was there to pick her son up early because there had been a family emergency. Although according to James Pitson, there was no family emergency. But since she was Timothy's mom, no one at the school questioned her.
The next sighting of Amy and Timothy happened about an hour and a half later. At 10 o'clock a.m., Amy dropped her 2004 Ford Expedition off at an auto repair shop about 30 miles away from their home in Aurora. According to James, Amy's Expedition was old and had well over 100,000 miles on it. So maybe she dropped her car off for repairs knowing that she planned on driving far.
The mechanics at the auto shop told Amy that the work would take several hours. So after Amy dropped off her car, they took a shuttle to Brookfield Zoo. Between 10.30 a.m. and 3 o'clock p.m. that afternoon, Amy and Timothy were at the zoo. The Brookfield Zoo was one of Timothy's favorite places and was only a couple miles away from the auto repair shop.
A little after 3 p.m., they returned to the auto shop to pick up the SUV. After that, they drove a little more than an hour north to Key Lime Cove Water Park, an indoor water park now known as Great Wolf Lodge. The Key Lime Cove Water Park was located in Gurney, Illinois, about a 50-mile drive from the auto shop and over 60 miles away from their home in Aurora.
After several hours at the zoo, Amy and Timothy found themselves at a water park. On the outside, this might sound like the best day ever for a six-year-old little boy. At first, he went to his favorite zoo, and now he's at a water park with his mom. But while Amy and Timothy went from the zoo to the water park, their family was frantically trying to get in touch with them.
Surveillance cameras at the Key Lime Cove Water Resort captured Amy and Timothy checking in. They reserved a room to stay the night there. On the surveillance camera, everything seemed completely normal. It looked like a mother and son were out for a little vacation.
The next day, Thursday, they checked out of the water park resort and headed to the Kalahari Resort in Wisconsin, about 170 miles away, and another water park. Along the way, Amy made two stops. The first stop was at a gas station along I-94 to get gas and some drinks.
Amy also went inside the gas station's convenience store and bought some clothes for Timothy, a toy car, and a craft kit. At this point, Amy still hadn't returned anyone's phone calls, and no one knew where she was. Amy then made a second stop, filling her gas tank at another station. The next sighting of Amy and Timothy came from the surveillance cameras at the Kalahari Resort. The Kalahari Resort is another water park.
Surveillance videos show her checking into a room at 3.40 p.m. And similar to the Key Lime Cove Water Resort, everything between Amy and Timothy seemed fine. They looked like a mother and son going to a water park. Although for Amy and Timothy, this was now the second water park they went to in less than 24 hours.
These images at the Kalahari Resort are the last known sighting of six-year-old Timothy. After they checked out of the second water park at the Kalahari Resort, they drove south on I-39, then west on I-88 for about 170 miles.
At 12.30 p.m., she stopped and called her brother-in-law and mother. On both phone calls, Timothy can be heard in the background, and Amy assured them everything was fine. Whatever happened to Timothy happened sometime after those two phone calls at 12.30 p.m.
After calling her mother and brother-in-law, Amy turned off her cell phone. She then drove south along the Rock River to Sterling, Illinois, a small town about 80 miles west of her home in Aurora. Amy's stop in Sterling, Illinois, confused investigators and her family. She had no connections to Sterling, so it didn't make any sense why she would stop there.
Investigators combed through Amy's I-pass records, her driving record on state freeways, and learned that she had been there before, but never mentioned it to James or her family. According to the I-pass records, Amy had driven to Sterling, Illinois twice before. She made the drive on February 18th and again on March 20th.
She spent four to five hours in the area both times before returning to the highway to head home to Aurora. She never told her family why she was there or what she was doing. What Amy did during her stop at Sterling is a mystery because the next sighting of Amy didn't happen until seven hours later. And when she was seen, Timothy wasn't with her.
Around 8 o'clock p.m. that night, Amy was captured on another surveillance video an entire seven hours after she stopped in Sterling, Illinois. Amy is seen inside a Sullivan's Foods grocery store in Winnebago, Illinois, a town west of Rockford and about 50 miles away from Sterling. But this time, surveillance cameras captured Amy inside the grocery store alone. Timothy isn't with her.
So a seven hour and 50 mile gap exists that are unaccounted for. Inside the store, she purchased milk, crackers, stationery and envelopes. The same stationery and envelopes that Amy used to write the two suicide letters. Surveillance cameras at the Rockford Motel captured her checking in at 11.15 p.m. But again, Timothy isn't with her.
Almost 12 hours later, a maid discovered Amy's body while going in to clean the room at 12.30 p.m. Besides the two suicide letters she wrote to her family, she also wrote a separate letter to the motel staff. In the letter, she apologized to the motel staff for having to clean up after her. As soon as Amy's body was discovered, every available law enforcement in the area began looking for Timothy.
The search included officers from the Aurora Police Department, the FBI, and the U.S. Marshal Services, as well as officers from surrounding counties. They all hoped that Amy might have dropped Timothy off with someone. No one believed she would have harmed him.
Maybe she found someone to take Timothy in and raise him. And to prevent anyone from knowing who he was, they changed his name and identity. And that's the reason she said, you'll never find him in both of her suicide letters. Law enforcement searched for Timothy everywhere. They conducted ground and aerial searches on long stretches of roads and parks between I-88 and I-39.
They also conducted extensive searches around Sterling, Illinois, where Amy and Timothy stopped for about seven hours. But none of the searches turned up anything. There was no sign of Timothy or his Spider-Man backpack that the police believed was still with him. Other than Amy's suicide letters, the biggest piece of evidence was her blue 2004 Ford Expedition found parked at the motel.
Inside the SUV, the police found a significant amount of blood in the backseat where Timothy usually sat. The blood was tested and came back as a positive match to Timothy's blood. But investigators couldn't tell how long the blood had been there. And according to James, Timothy's father, the blood came from a nosebleed that Timothy suffered about a year ago.
The police also tested the knife that Amy had used to cut her neck and wrist, but the only DNA recovered belonged to Amy. Timothy's DNA wasn't on it. The police sent Amy's SUV to a private forensic lab in Elgin, Illinois to have it tested. They wanted to see if they could find anything that might provide a clue about where Timothy was or what happened to him.
The following is what the private lab found about where Amy's SUV was parked. Quote,
Sediments and plant material on the vehicle indicate that it was stopped for an unknown period of time on a wide gravel shoulder, gravel road, or short gravel turnout either adjacent to or just off of an asphalt secondary road that at one point had been treated with glass road marking beads.
In close proximity to the gravel shoulder or road where the vehicle stopped, it backed into a grassy meadow or field to a spot that is nearly treeless. There are birch and oak trees in the general area, but not directly over or at the spot where the SUV stopped.
The report also concluded that there was no corn growing in or around the spot where the SUV was parked. There was also no indication that the area had been recently used for agriculture in the recent past.
The evidence found on the car strongly suggests that grasses may have been the only major plants growing in the immediate area. The evidence told the private lab that it was likely a meadow and not, for example, a field that had once been farmland. Forensic testing indicates that the grass wasn't cut, which rules out a residential lawn or a park.
The lab also found strong evidence of a pond, small stream, or creek where Amy parked the SUV. Based on the forensic testing on the car, the police believe they are looking for a meadow in northwestern Illinois with Lee and Whiteside counties being the most likely locations. This is where they believe that whatever happened to Timothy happened there.
but certain areas outside Lee and Whiteside counties can't be ruled out either. These areas include Carroll, Stevenson, and Winnebago counties. The forensic testing on Amy's SUV is helpful, but the results don't pinpoint a specific area. There are potentially thousands of miles of search areas that fit this type of meadow.
And even if the police identify the specific location where Amy's SUV stopped, there's no promise they'll find anything there. If Timothy was killed there, they might find evidence, including remains. But if he wasn't killed there and Amy dropped him off with someone, they might not find anything there, even if they do find the spot.
The search for Timothy continued for the next several months. Investigators combed through Amy's cell phone records, email, and financial statements hoping for a clue, but they didn't find anything. They did, however, find a secret email account that no one knew she had. But forensic investigators didn't find anything helpful in the inbox. Most of the 32 messages in there were spam.
Seven months into the investigation, the police received a promising tip. In late December 2011, the police received a tip about a possible sighting of Timothy. Someone had called in a tip saying that they thought they saw someone matching Timothy's description at a Denny's restaurant in North Aurora. But when the police investigated the tip, it turned out to be a dead end.
The police found the car the boy had left the Denny's in, and it turned out he was the driver's son. It wasn't Timothy. After this tip, the case went cold. Years passed without any sign of Timothy or information about what happened to him. James Pitson tried his best to move on with his life after the loss of Amy and not knowing what happened to their six-year-old son.
He constantly struggled with Amy's suicide letter that said, you'll never find him. Two years after Timothy disappeared, there was another big break in the case. In October 2013, a woman turned Amy's missing cell phone over to the police. According to the woman, she found the cell phone on the side of a road north of Mount Carroll, Illinois.
She said she found it two years earlier but didn't turn it over to the police because she said that she didn't know that it belonged to Amy or had anything to do with the case. According to the woman, when her brother needed a cell phone, she remembered the phone she found and gave it to him to use. As soon as he charged it up and saw the names on the contact list, he recognized it as Amy's cell phone and they immediately turned it over to the police.
Although the discovery of Amy's missing cell phone initially seemed promising, nothing came of it. The police found nothing new on the phone that told them where Timothy was or what Amy did to him. Several years passed and many feared we would never know what happened. But the case made headlines across the country in April 2019.
And for the first time in years, everyone thought we finally found Timothy. In April 2019, a teenager in Newport, Kentucky, went to the police and told them he was 14-year-old Timothy Pitson. He said he had finally escaped from the two men who had been holding him hostage in an Ohio Red Roof Inn. He provided the police with descriptions of the two men and their SUV.
The teenager also told the police where they could find the men. After the teen walked into the police station and said that he was Timothy Pitson, two Aurora detectives were sent to Kentucky to interview him. But they were skeptical as soon as they sat down with him. The first thing the detectives did was ask the teenager for his fingerprints. They needed forensic proof he was actually who he said he was.
But to their surprise, the teenager refused. He wouldn't allow them to take his fingerprints, but he did consent to a DNA test. As soon as word broke that a teenager came forward claiming to be Timothy, newspapers across the country ran the story. Finally, after eight long years, Timothy may have been found. But unfortunately, that wasn't the case.
The young man who told the police that he was Timothy Pitson turned out to be lying. In fact, he wasn't even a 14-year-old teenage boy. Instead, he was 23-year-old Brian Reaney, a convicted felon from Ohio.
Since he had been previously convicted of a felony, the police had his DNA on record. And when his DNA was compared to Timothy's, it wasn't a match. And he was identified by his criminal record as Brian Reaney.
When investigators asked Brian Reaney why he came forward claiming to be Timothy Pitson, he said he saw a television interview with James Pitson and he decided he wanted a dad just like him. So he came up with the story. The Brian Reaney incident in April 2019 was devastating to the Pitson family. For the first time in over eight years, they thought they finally found him.
They were ecstatic to hear that he was still alive and had been found. So when they discovered that Brian Reedy made it up and wasn't who he said he was, the family was crushed. And Brian Reedy was ultimately charged with identity theft and making a false statement to law enforcement.
Immediately following the Brian Reaney case, the case received new coverage in the media, and the police hoped that the increased awareness of the case would bring in additional tips. But they were wrong. The increased publicity didn't bring any new leads, and the case went cold again. Timothy's father, James, believes his son is alive somewhere. No one in the family believes that Amy would have ever done something to harm him.
She may have been depressed and suffering, but they don't think that she could physically hurt Timothy or kill him. Over the years, there have been a lot of theories about what might have happened to Timothy. His family believes he's alive somewhere and that Amy dropped him off with someone during that stop in Sterling, Illinois.
They believe during that seven-hour time frame where Amy and Timothy's whereabouts are unaccounted for is when she dropped him off. There was also speculation that Amy drove to Sterling, Illinois twice in the months leading up to his disappearance to meet up with someone and that whoever took Timothy changed his name and identity so that no one could find him.
Those who believe this story point to Amy's suicide letters. In the letters, Amy insisted that Timothy is fine and that he's with people who will love him and take care of him. But not everyone agrees with this theory. Some people fear that Timothy is dead and Amy might have done something to him.
Those who believe this theory suggest Amy made those two stops in Sterling to scope out the area as a possible dump site, even though several searches of Sterling have revealed nothing. In May 2021, 10 years after Timothy went missing, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children released a new age progression image that shows what he may look like now at the age of 16.
In a public statement released by NBC Chicago, the chief of the Aurora Police Department said, quote, Our investigation remains active and we're committed to finding answers for the Pitson family.
We hope this new image created by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children forensic artists will allow someone to recognize what Timothy might look like today and help us find him. End quote. As of today, the new forensic sketch hasn't created any new or promising leads.
Timothy Pitson was 6 years old when he disappeared in May 2011. He has brown eyes and brown hair. In 2011, he was 4 feet 2 inches and weighed 70 pounds. Today, he would be 18 years old. He may also go by the nicknames Tim or Timmy. He was last seen wearing blue or green shorts, a brown t-shirt, and white socks.
He was carrying his favorite Spider-Man backpack, and the backpack also remains missing. Anyone with information about Timothy Pitson's whereabouts is asked to contact the Aurora Police Department at 630-256-5000. The Aurora Area Crime Stoppers is offering a cash reward of up to $5,000 for any information that leads to Timothy.
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You'll want to check this one out because I'm going to share what I think happened to Timothy Pitson. Don't forget to subscribe to Forensic Tales so you don't miss an episode. We release a new episode every Monday. If you love the show, consider leaving us a positive review or tell friends and family about us. You can also help support the show through Patreon.
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