It was supposed to be an ordinary February evening in Benton Township, Michigan.
Dinner was almost ready. The family dog needed a walk.
And 12-year-old Steven Craft Jr. — bright, creative, and full of life — said he’d be right back.
He never was.
On February 15, 2001, Steven grabbed a light jacket, leashed his two dogs, and told his mother he was heading to a friend’s house just a few blocks away. The sun had barely set. By the time darkness fell, he had vanished without a trace.
When Steven didn’t return home, his family began calling friends, neighbors, anyone who might have seen him. Hours passed. No answers. By 1 AM, panic set in, and police were called. A massive search began — but Benton Township would never be the same again.
Neighbors recalled seeing Steven walking his dogs near Harbor Haven Ministries, bundled against the winter cold. But as search teams combed the area, only one chilling detail emerged: Steven’s dogs came home… but he didn’t.
One of the animals reportedly kept returning to the same patch of woods near Harbor Haven — as if trying to lead rescuers to something. But despite days of searching frozen ponds, fields, and wooded trails, no trace of Steven or his belongings was ever found.
At first, investigators hoped this was a case of a runaway. That hope quickly vanished. By the end of the week, it became clear: something terrible had happened.
Then came a disturbing twist. In 2007, authorities uncovered a potential link to Michael Devlin, a convicted child molester and kidnapper who had abducted two boys — Ben Ownby and Shawn Hornbeck — in Missouri. The pattern was eerily similar: young boys, vanished suddenly, no witnesses, no trace.
The FBI descended on Devlin’s properties, searching for any evidence tying him to Steven’s disappearance. But once again, the case hit a wall — no connection, no closure.
Years turned into decades. Leads went cold. Witnesses moved away. Benton Township changed, its quiet streets paved over, and the Craft family home eventually demolished to make way for an airport expansion.
And yet… the memory of that night still lingers.
Steven’s parents, who never gave up searching, both passed away in 2021 without answers. Their last wish — that someone, someday, would find out what really happened to their son — remains unfulfilled.
Today, 24 years later, Steven’s case remains open, one of Michigan’s most haunting unsolved disappearances.
There are no suspects. No body. No closure.
Only the echoes of a small boy’s promise — “I’ll be right back” — still haunting the people who remember.
🕯️ Gone before dinner. Never forgotten.
