Amela Pasanbegovic was 20 when she and her 22-year-old sister Dzeneta disappeared from Hanover Park, Illinois, on or around July 11, 1995. The sisters had recently arrived in the United States from Bosnia-Herzegovina and had been living together in Hanover Park for about six months. They were reported missing on July 24, 1995, nearly two weeks after they were last seen.

Their bodies were never recovered, but a man later confessed to murdering both sisters and was prosecuted; he is serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole. The Pasanbegovic sisters were their parents’ only children, and their deaths devastated family and community.