Some cases haunt a community for decades: The children taken from front yards, college students who never made it home, and women whose lives were taken without explanation. The missing and murdered.

Across northern Illinois, dozens of cases remain unsolved, leaving behind grieving families, unanswered questions, and a lingering pursuit of justice.

Here are some of the crimes that remain a mystery in Northern Illinois.

Donna Doll- Oct. 2, 1970

Donna Doll, a 21-year-old Northern Illinois University student, was last seen leaving her part-time job at Swen Parson Library on campus the evening of Oct. 2, 1970. She never made it home.

Doll was missing for more than a week before her body was discovered by three teenagers on Nelson Road west of DeKalb on Oct. 11. She had been suffocated.

Anyone with information on this case should contact the DeKalb County Sheriff’s Office at 815-895-2155.

Christine Meadors- Nov. 5, 1973

On the evening of Nov. 4, 1973, Christine Meadors, 15, of Lockport, was seen by her mother before she headed to bed. By the time her father arrived home from work at 5:30 a.m. on Nov. 5, she was gone.

According to an April 24, 1974, article in the Southtown Star, there was evidence that the home was “entered forcibly”, but there was no evidence of a struggle or noise that woke her mother.

Five months later, on April 16, 1974, Meadors’ body was found inside a women’s restroom in Messenger Woods Forest Preserve, in Homer Glen, wearing the same clothing she had been wearing the night she disappeared.

It was determined that her body had been in the restroom for about two weeks. There was no evidence of trauma or violence to her body. But, because someone had tried to conceal her body, police suspected foul play.

Anyone with information can contact Will County Crime Stoppers by telephone at 800-323-6734 or www.crimestoppersofwillcounty.org/submit-a-tip/.

Rose Marie Whitney- Jan. 17, 1976

Rose Marie Whitney, of Maple Park, was just 13 when she vanished from her farm home on Jan. 17, 1976, while babysitting her two-year-old brother, Timmy.

Her parents identified her body at St. Joseph Hospital in Elgin on Feb. 10, after a man discovered her body while gathering firewood five miles south of Burlington.

According to a Feb. 12, 1976, article in the Chicago Tribune, Whitney was shot in the head with a .38 caliber bullet. The autopsy report concluded that someone stood at least a foot away from Whitney while she kneeled with her hands in the pocket of her blue jacket.

Tammy Zywicki - Aug. 23, 1992

It’s one of the most infamous crimes La Salle County has seen: the murder of 21-year-old college student Tammy Zywicki. More than 30 years ago, Zywicki dropped her brother off at Northwestern University in Evanston and headed to Grinnell College in Iowa.

She was last seen with her car on Interstate 80 near Utica on Aug. 23, 1992. A little more than a week later, her body was found along Interstate 44 between Joplin and Springfield, Missouri. She had been stabbed to death.

Anyone with information regarding the case should contact the Illinois State Police at 815-726-6377.

Dalton Mesarchik - March 26, 2003

The slaying of 7-year-old Dalton Mesarchik has lingered in the community since his body was found in the Vermilion River on the morning of March 27, 2003, fewer than 24 hours after he was reported missing.

Dalton disappeared from his front yard in Streator while waiting for a ride to Bible study at the local church.

Anyone with information on the case is asked to contact the Dalton Mesarchik Task Force at 815-844-1500 (ext. 2321) or email daltonm@isp.state.il.us.

Timmothy Pitzen - May 13, 2011

The last time Jim Pitzen saw his six-year-old son, Timmothy, was on Wednesday, May 11, 2011, when he dropped him off at his kindergarten class at Greenman Elementary School in Aurora.

His mother, Amy Fry-Pitzen, checked him out of class between 8:10 and 8:15 a.m., citing a non-existent family emergency, according to an April 5, 2019, article in The Post-Star. Fry-Pitzen then took her son on a two-day road trip to the zoo and a water park.

Then she wrote a note saying that her son was safe with people who would love and care for him, and added, “You will never find him, according to an article in The Post-Star.

And then she took her own life at a Rockford hotel on May 15.

Pitzen has not been seen since.

Police have said he may have been dropped off with a friend, noting that his car seat and Spider-Man backpack were gone.

If you have any information about Timmothy or his disappearance, please call NCMEC at 1-800-843-5678 or the Aurora Police Department (Illinois) at 1-630-256-5516.

The following have provided all cases, names and descriptions: the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs), the Missing Persons Awareness Network, Newspapers.com and the Shaw Local News Network archive.