Michael Rolle, 23, of south suburban Lansing, was found beaten to death in the 9200 block of South St. Lawrence Avenue in Burnside, on Chicago's Far South Side, on Thursday, December 19, 2019. Chicago police investigated his death, and the Chicago Sun-Times homicide tracker, which lists every homicide in the city, records it as a homicide by assault.
According to Chicago police, Rolle was kidnapped that Thursday afternoon in Country Club Hills, a south suburb, and beaten to death. CBS Chicago reported that his attackers tied him up and beat him with a blunt object, and that he was barely alive when they left him, half naked, under a viaduct near 93rd Street and St. Lawrence Avenue. ABC7 Chicago reported severe trauma to his face and neck. No one else was reported hurt.
Police released no description of the people who took him, no vehicle and no motive. Rolle's mother, Patrice Rolle, made a direct appeal to whoever was responsible: "I want justice.
I want my son back, but I know I can't have him back. Justice would do me fine," she said. "So please, whoever you are, let us know. Turn yourselves in." No reward tied to his case appears in the public record.
Rolle was a sophomore at Parkland College and the oldest of six siblings. He had been engaged to his fiancee, Jada Siler, for more than a year. "Jada was his world," his sister Trinity Wilson said, adding, "His family was his main concern. He didn't care about nothing else but his family." His youngest sister, Taryn Wilson, said, "My knees went weak and my heart just dropped. He was always there for me when I needed somebody the most." His godmother, Nicole McFerren, with whom he lived, said, "I couldn't ask for a better godson," and described watching from her window for his car.
His family spent Christmas Eve 2019 preparing for his funeral. A GoFundMe page for his funeral raised about $1,921 toward a $4,500 goal, and an online obituary notes that he died on Thursday, December 19, 2019.
Burnside is one of Chicago's smallest community areas, a pocket of homes on the Far South Side ringed by railroad embankments and viaducts. The viaduct where Rolle was left is the kind of place drivers and pedestrians pass every day, and someone in the area that Thursday may have noticed a vehicle stopping there or people carrying someone from it.
Chicago recorded about 500 homicides in 2019, and police reported clearing roughly half of the city's homicides in the years that followed, though that figure counts some cases closed without charges.
Searches for his name also turn up other men named Michael Rolle, including one charged in a 2009 Chicago police standoff and one convicted of a killing in London. Neither is the Lansing student.
No arrest, criminal charge or court case connected to the death of Michael Rolle could be found in news archives or public records. More than 6 years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who saw him in Country Club Hills on the afternoon of December 19, 2019, or who saw a vehicle near the viaduct at 93rd Street and St. Lawrence Avenue that day, may be able to help. Even a small detail, such as a name overheard, a person seen running from the area or a conversation remembered, can help detectives move a case forward. Anyone with information can call the Chicago Police Department's anonymous tip line at (833) 408-0069 or submit a tip online at CPDTIP.com, or contact Cook County Crime Stoppers at (800) 535-STOP (7867).
