Police looking for missing 8th grade girl who hasn't been seen for a week
Missing Steger girl Karissa Clausen Breshars
(STEGER) Authorities on Saturday asked for the public’s help in finding a 14-year-old girl who disappeared a week ago from south suburban Steger.
Karissa Clausen-Breshars was last seen Dec. 8 at the Steger-South Chicago Heights Public Library with her sister, according to her mother, Jacki Clausen, and Steger police. She is a 5-foot-3, 160-pound girl who was last seen wearing a black puffy coat, black T-shirt, black leggings and black shoes.
The girl left the family’s home about 2 p.m. and met her sister at the library at 54 E. 31st St., her mother said.
Clausen-Breshars’ sister lost track of the 14-year-old at the library, initially thinking she had gone home early. But Clausen-Breshars wasn’t home when the sister returned home about 5 p.m.
Police say she walked away from the library in an unknown direction.
Clausen-Breshars frequents the forest preserves between Steger, South Chicago Heights and Park Forest, according to police. She has also been known to hitchhike and has been driven as far away as Kankakee and Morocco, Indiana, police said.
Her mother noted that she took nothing with her when she went left for the library, and that volunteer search parties continued to search the area Saturday. Clausen-Breshars is an eighth-grader at Columbia Central Middle School and an avid reader.
Her disappearance remains under investigation, and anyone with information was asked to call Steger police at (708) 754-8121 for dispatch, or (708) 755-0223 during business hours.