DeOrr's mother: 'If he sees this, somebody might bring him home'

IDAHO FALLS -- Jessica Mitchell, the mother of missing Idaho Falls toddler DeOrr Kunz Jr, believes her son may still be alive and says she will continue to search for him.

Mitchell spoke with EastIdahoNews.com at a candlelight vigil held in her son's honor Monday evening at Freeman Park. It was exactly two years ago that day when DeOrr vanished while on a camping trip with Mitchell, Vernal Kunz (his father), Robert Walton (his great-grandfather) and Isaac Reinwand (a friend of his great-grandfather).

"I'm just lost. I don't know how to live without my son. Some people say time can heal wounds and it doesn't. Two years doesn't make it easier," Mitchell said. "I still struggle every day to get out of bed and continue on my life because there's times I just want to be in the exact same spot doing the exact same thing as when he was home with me."

Mitchell said it's hard to imagine that DeOrr would be four years old right now and she wonders what he looks like.

"I don't think of him aging. I just feel like when we find him he will look exactly the same - in the same clothes and the same size," Mitchell said. "I know that's not the truth and he's going to be a lot bigger."

Despite numerous searches in and around the Timber Creek Campground in Lemhi County, no sign of DeOrr has ever been found. Investigators have named Mitchell and Kunz as suspects in the child's disappearance but they have never been arrested or charged.

Mitchell hopes someone seeing the news "might bring him back" and said she is determined to bring DeOrr home.

"I hold on to hope to anything," Mitchell said. "I'm still going to pass our flyers and I'm still going to keep his face out there because I don't have answers."