Sixteen-year-old Deborah Lynn Rosencrans was undergoing some trying family turmoil. Her parents were divorced, and her mother had been forced to work several jobs in order to make ends meet. Recently, though, Deborah’s mother had remarried, and the family was planning to move back to their former home in Orlando, Florida. Deborah, though, wanted to stay behind in Chicago, Illinois for a little while, not least because one of her closest friends was getting married, and she wanted to be around to attend the wedding.
Deborah’s mother and stepfather agreed to let her stay with friends in Illinois for a while, at least until they got settled back in Florida. Deborah, a somewhat willful girl, had been acting out a great deal lately, even getting into some trouble with police for robberies and other minor crimes. She also refused to go to school, although the family she was staying with didn’t seem to mind, and unfortunately, also didn’t appear to be watching her movements too closely.
On one day in early September of 1977, Deborah went out to do whatever it was she was doing, and though she didn’t come home, her hosts were used to her shenanigans, and were evidently not alarmed.
On Tuesday, September 6th, a hitchhiker thought he heard moaning coming from beneath a bush in Shiller Park Woods. Peering into the underbrush, the hitchhiker discovered a teenaged girl wrapped up in blankets that had been tightly wound with lengths of rope. She was still alive, but had been so badly beaten that her face was nearly unrecognizable.
The girl was taken to the nearest hospital, where she languished for nearly two weeks, unidentified. She was still considered a Jane Doe when she finally died from her injuries on September 18th, 1977. It wasn’t until October 3rd that friends and relatives identified the murdered teenager as Deborah Rosencrans.
Due to Deborah’s history of petty crime and her tendency to run away from home, there was no shortage of possible scenarios whereby she could have ended up as she did. The first individual placed under scrutiny by police was the hitchhiker who found the wounded girl. Though he reportedly failed a polygraph test when asked about his involvement in the victim’s beating, there appeared to be no further evidence to link him to the crime.
Also considered was an unnamed twenty-seven-year-old man who had been in and out of mental hospitals and who was suspected of assaulting a seven-year-old girl. According to police reports at the time, Deborah was acquainted with this individual, but likewise, this suspect was never charged.
Authorities were also interested in questioning Deborah’s boyfriend, who witnesses knew only as Mike, and the driver of a blue Oldsmobile that Deborah had apparently been seen sitting in on the same day she was attacked. Neither of these leads resulted in any significant progress, and indeed, her murder remains unsolved and sadly, almost forgotten.
Crime Immemorial 