14-year-old says he is Illinois boy who went missing in 2011

In 2011, 6-year-old Timmothy Pitzen's mother picked him up at school in Illinois, took him to the zoo and a water park, and then killed herself at a hotel, leaving a note in which she said her son was fine but that no one would ever find him.

On Wednesday, a 14-year-old boy came forward to tell authorities he is Timmothy.

The boy claimed he escaped from two kidnappers in the Cincinnati area and then fled across a bridge into Kentucky.

Authorities from Timmothy's hometown of Aurora, Illinois, are now checking out the teenager's story.

"We've probably had thousands of tips of him popping up in different areas," Aurora police Sgt. Bill Rowley said.

"We have no idea what we're driving down there for. It could be Pitzen. It could be a hoax." Timmothy Pitzen's grandmother, Alana Anderson, told WISN-TV Wednesday that authorities have told the family "very little." "We just know a 14-year-old boy was found and went to the police," Anderson said. "We don't want to get our hopes up and our family's hopes up until we know something. We just don't want to get our hopes up. We've had false reports and false hopes before."
"The City of Sharonville Police Department, like every other police agency in the greater Cincinnati area, was requested to check their Red Roof Inn hotels regarding this incident," the post read. "To the best of our knowledge, we have no information indicating that the missing juvenile was ever in the City of Sharonville."