Remains found of missing man
After three months of waiting, Shirley Burton of North Chicago finally has gotten closure she prayed for.
It was one she’d dreaded.
The body of her father, George Lawson, an 82-year-old Alzheimer’s patient she’d reported missing July 23, was found Wednesday.
Burton got the news after two boys riding all-terrain vehicles Tuesday came across skeletal remains in marshes near Abbott Laboratories, at 1401 N. Sheridan in the north suburb. Converging on the site, North Chicago Police had found all the remains by Wednesday.
Lawson was profiled this week in a Sun-Times series which found police in Chicago and other jurisdictions were reluctant to take reports for missing adults, often doing only cursory investigations. Like many suburbs, North Chicago did little more than enter Burton’s father into a database and ask officers to be on the lookout.
Lawson’s wallet was found on Abbott’s grounds days after he wandered off, but North Chicago police failed to find him in a canvass then.
“He didn’t make it far, and yet they never found him,” Burton said.
Lawson, who was in need of heart medication, apparently died of natural causes.