Chaos Divers find car in Hodgkins, Illinois, retention pond linked to 2001 missing person's case
A 20-year-old mystery may be solved thanks to a special dive team and a recovered vehicle.
The Chaos Divers found the car in a southwest suburban retention pond over the weekend with human remains inside.
It was a site dozens of people came to watch next to the Hodgkins Target off Joliet Road this past weekend. A car full of mud and soot pulled out of the pond.
Jose Zaragoza said he watched the whole scene play out.
"Watching this at first, I was like, I've seen this on TV before, like ID channel things like that," he said.
"As soon as the little buddy went over that with the sonar, we were like, 'Oh my gosh, we have a car!'"
Lindsay Bussick is with the Chaos Divers.
CBS News Chicago introduced the team last week when they said they found more than 90 cars while boating around the Chicago River, while on a mission to solve cold cases.
Bussick said they came to the retention pond to work on a different missing persons case when they found the car.
"This would probably be the smallest body of water that we've located a vehicle in," she said.
Hodgkins police said the recovered sedan is a 1998 Lincoln Town Car with human remains still inside. They connected it to a 2001 missing persons case.
"I sensed there was somebody in there just by the reaction of the diver and police officer," Zaragoza said.
Hodgkins police said they are confident the medical examiner's office will be able to identify who was in the car. They said they are still shocked and never wouldn't expected this 5-foot deep retention pond would cover a car for over 20 years.
"That water is so murky that the divers, when Jacob and Derrick went down that way, they couldn't even see the vehicle. Everything they did that day was completely by brail," Bussick said.
She said that when they find cars like this, it brings grief and relief to families.
"Regardless of who it ends up being, we are just incredibly grateful that we have been able to provide them some answers," Bussick said.
And while police said this is under investigation, people who drive near this area often, like Zaragosa, are baffled that the closure one family needed was under the water here all this time.
"I know it happened over 20 years ago, but didn't anybody see tire tracks or something like that?" he said.