Mom refuses to give up searching for lost son

OAKWOOD, Ill. -- It has been a year since Linda Katcher last saw her son, Ryan.

"He once gave me a birthday card that read 'I was going to give you a trip to the Bahamas -- but I knew you'd miss me too much,'" she said.

There's no doubt about how much Katcher misses her son today and every day.

"It's been a struggle to be able to say it's been a year," Katcher said, the words catching and tears beginning to stream down her face.

"I've been through all the scenarios," Katcher said, composing herself. "I prefer to envision him in a homeless shelter not knowing who he is."

Ryan disappeared Nov. 5, 2000. His mother went back to her nursing duties in January, in the emergency room of Provena United Samaritans Medical Center in Danville, asking co-workers for their prayers and support, but also asking them not to talk about the disappearance.

"It's just that everywhere I go, I'm approached," she said. "Sometimes, I just have to turn away."

Three points of focus

Katcher continues to get the word out about the disappearance. She said she will have three focuses for the upcoming year: To always know what's going on with the investigation, to get all the information she can out -- via posters and especially the Web site devoted to the case -- and to increase the reward fund, which stands at $7,500.

"Now, with so much tragedy in the world, I wonder how I make Ryan's story as compelling," Katcher said. "I'm not the first mom to go through this and, unfortunately, I won't be the last."

After nearly a year, as far as Katcher is concerned, the question is still, "Where's Ryan?" Neither she nor the Vermilion County Sheriff's Office is any closer to an answer.

The 20-year-old University of Illinois student was last seen at his Oakwood home when a friend dropped him off about 2 a.m. after a party.

"It's still a mystery," said Capt. Gary Miller, chief investigator with the Vermilion County Sheriff's Office. ""I try to keep in mind that as frustrating as it is for me, it's nothing compared to what Linda is going through."

No direction for police

During the first weeks, law enforcement, Emergency Management Agency personnel, friends and family searched river banks and fields, then winter set in. In the spring, help was asked of boaters, farmers, even mushroomers.

"In my 29 years in the department, I've never had a case like this," Miller said.

Other cases involving a disappearance at least gave police some direction, he said, but not this one.

"It's a very strange case," he said. Usually "you are focused in on a specific direction by this time, really, earlier, but we've had nothing to point us in any direction."

Miller said they found no tracks or broken trees leading to water during the early searches, and some bodies of water could be eliminated because a vehicle couldn't have reached them or because the truck would have to be driven out in the water quite a way to become submerged.

Ryan Katcher's black 1999 Ford F-150 also disappeared Nov. 5.