Prosecutors said that a Marengo man is under investigation for the murder of a missing Harvard woman who was found dead in a storage unit in Winnebago County in March.
Michelle Arnold-Boesigner, 33, of Harvard, was reported missing to the Holiday Hills Police Department on January 3.
The Holiday Hills Police Department later turned the investigation over to the McHenry County Sheriff’s Office on January 26.
Through the course of the investigation, probable cause was established to obtain a search warrant at the U-Haul Storage of Roscoe, 12522 North 2nd Street in Roscoe, the McHenry County Sheriff’s Office said at the time.
The McHenry County Sheriff’s Office, Winnebago County Sheriff’s Office, Wisconsin Department of Criminal Investigations and Roscoe Police Department executed the warrant search on March 2.
Officers found a deceased body inside the storage unit at the facility, according to the McHenry County Sheriff’s Office.
The Winnebago County Coroner’s Office identified the body as Arnold-Boesigner. Months later, the coroner’s office has still not said what the woman’s cause and manner of death was.
On Thursday, Jonathan J. Van Duyn, 33, appeared in court on trial for charges of aggravated domestic battery by strangulation, two counts of domestic battery and one count of criminal damage to property.
Van Duyn, who was Arnold-Boesigner’s boyfriend, was accused of stealing the woman’s pain medication and strangling her in July 2019, according to an order of protection petition that she filed shortly after the incident.
Arnold-Boesigner claimed that Van Duyn bit her lips to get her to stop yelling and continued to strangle her until she nearly blacked out, the order of protection petition said.
“I am afraid of what Jonathan may be capable of, especially now that the police and courts have become involved. I am afraid for my safety,” Arnold-Boesigner said at the end of her petition.
Van Duyn, of the 400 block of Locust Street in Marengo, was arrested in Indiana in December, which was the same time when Arnold-Boesigner disappeared.
He was transported to the McHenry County Jail where he was being held on the domestic battery charges from his 2019 case.
Arnold-Boesigner wasn’t officially reported missing until January 3, but a police report shows that her cellphone activity stopped on December 14, according to the Northwest Herald.
During the Thursday trial, the McHenry County State’s Attorney’s Office dropped the domestic battery charges against Van Duyn because prosecutors no longer had Arnold-Boesigner’s testimony, the Northwest Herald reported.
“We’re certainly motivated to proceed with a domestic battery charge in view of the defendant’s history as well as the fact that the victim is no longer here and he’s under investigation for murder,” McHenry County State’s Attorney Patrick Kenneally told the paper after court Thursday.
Van Duyn, nor anyone else, have been charged with the murder of Arnold-Boesigner yet, court records show.
Van Duyn remains held in the McHenry County Jail awaiting extradition to Wisconsin for an unrelated criminal case of interfering with child custody.
Anyone with information on Arnold-Boesigner’s death is asked to contact the McHenry County Sheriff Criminal Investigation Division at 815-334-4750.