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Is Streamwood the connection to a 31-year-old North Carolina cold case?

The solution to a 31-year-old North Carolina cold case may lie here in Streamwood.

Law enforcement and child welfare authorities hope a newly reconstructed photo of a teenager — who died in 1984 and who may have attended Streamwood High School — will help identify him, and finally close the case.

Remains of a young man between 15 and 20 years old were found near the Thorpe Reservoir Dam, about 70 miles southwest of Asheville, North Carolina, on Feb. 12, 1984, said Carol Schweitzer, senior forensic case specialist with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

The boy was under a quilt with a gunshot wound to the head and a rifle nearby. The death was ruled a suicide, according to the Jackson County sheriff's office, but officials could never find his family, largely because he had been using an alias and his real name was never known.

Among the boy's possessions was a McDonald's place mat where he had written his job and education history as if he was listing bullet points for a resume, Schweitzer said. One of those bullet points was Streamwood High School, meaning he may have attended there.

In 2012, the center sent a team of volunteers to Jackson County to meet with investigators and cast a fresh set of eyes on the case files.

“A lot of it is just the manpower and the time to be able to make phone calls, to research leads, to talk to people,” Schweitzer said.

Now, experts have created a digitally enhanced image of the boy based on a photograph of his skull in hopes of generating new leads.

Since the image was released in 2013 about 20 leads have come in, but nothing definite, Schweitzer said.

Meanwhile they've been trying to piece together a broken history for the boy, who may have left Streamwood at a young age and lived in Memphis for a short time before living in the shadows of the Appalachian Mountains in North Carolina.

Streamwood Police Chief James Gremo said a search of the department's archives shows police here were never contacted by North Carolina authorities. They also never took a missing persons report during that time frame.

“Just trying to re-create history is very difficult in these old cases,” Schweitzer said.

Schweitzer said it looks like the boy had been in North Carolina for about a year, arriving in the fall of 1983 and using an alias.

He was going by the name John Norris. That name was found on identification on the boy's body, but when authorities tracked down the real John Norris, he was living in Florida and said he had lost his wallet in the spring of 1983, Schweitzer said.

Writing on the back of the menu also suggested the boy had worked as a busboy at two restaurants in Memphis, Tennessee, between December 1978 and January 1983.

Streamwood High School opened in 1978, so the boy may have been one of the first students to attend, but school officials did not respond to questions about the case this week.

According to a story in the Crossroads Chronicle, a newspaper covering the area where the boy was found, Jackson County sheriff's police think the boy and an acquaintance were living in a tent in the woods near where he was found.

They also say he worked at an area restaurant called Leah's for a short time before his death but had been fired.

Leah's closed in 1991, but former owner Leah Tove said she still remembers the boy and his death well.

“He was just a young kid,” she said.

Tove said she thinks the boy looked a little different from the reconstructed photo.

“He worked his hair shorter, parted to the side,” she said. “I think he was better looking than that. He had the perfect, model face.”

Tove said she thought he was 17 or 18 years old, but she didn't know he was living in a tent at the time. The boy worked for her for only a few months, and because it was a small business that didn't keep records of applications, Tove doesn't have any information on the boy beyond the fake name he was using at the time.

Tove said she's never forgotten her former employee or the mystery surrounding his death.

She's spent hours searching through photos of missing children online and watching John Walsh's former show “America's Most Wanted” hoping to see a familiar face.

“I think closure is really important to people,” Tove said.

Jackson County sheriff's police said there is no DNA because the boy's body was cremated. His dental records were not helpful because he had had no dental work.

Investigators believe the boy was transient and had lost touch with relatives, but that hasn't stopped the center from trying to find his family more than 30 years after his death.

​“The hardest part about this case is we really don't have a good indication of where he is originally from,” Schweizer said.

The boy was described as being Caucasian with short, light brown hair. He was about 5 feet, 9 inches tall and weighed 171 pounds. He was found wearing jeans, a blue plaid long-sleeved shirt, a brown jacket and sneakers.

Anyone with information or tips about the unidentified boy is asked to call 1-800-THE-LOST or fill out a tip report at www.missingkids.com.

Tove said she hopes the mystery comes to a conclusion for the boy's family's sake.

“If they don't find out what happened they will always worry and hope and wonder,” Tove said. “It's better to know.”

The body of a teenager, whose image is reconstructed above, was found in this area near Glenville, North Carolina, Feb. 12, 1984. Courtesy of the Crossroads Chronicle
The body was found near this bridge, near Glenville, North Carolina. Courtesy of the Crossroads Chronicle
The boy's body was found in the woods near this bridge, near Glenville, North Carolina. Courtesy of the Crossroads Chronicle
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