NJ's Timothy Wiltsey Case Featured On 'Dateline' Friday Night

SAYREVILLE, NJ — One of New Jersey's most tragic and haunting stories, the death of 5-year-old Timothy Wiltsey, will be featured in a brand-new Dateline episode that will air at 9 p.m. this Friday night, April 29 on NBC.

Friday night's show will feature Andrea Canning’s exclusive TV interviews with local New Jersey detectives involved in the investigation, as well as interviews with family members of Timmy’s mother, Michelle Lodzinski.

Lodzinski herself will not be interviewed — although she is now a free woman thanks to the NJ Supreme Court overturning her murder conviction in her son's death. Her older sister, Linda Hise, will be interviewed Friday night.

Timothy was last seen at a Sayreville carnival on May 25, 1991. The boy's skeleton remains were found a year later, in April 1992, in a marshy creek in Raritan Center in Edison.

In 2016, 25 years after the boy died, a Middlesex County jury found Lodzinski guilty of first-degree murder for her son's death. She was sentenced to 30 years in state prison.

However, in late December 2021, all of New Jersey was stunned when the New Jersey Supreme Court — the highest court in the state — vacated the murder conviction. Up until then, Lodzinkski had been serving her sentence at the Edna Mahan Correctional Facility in Hunterdon County.

Shortly after the court's Dec. 28, 2021 decision, Lodzinski walked out of prison a free woman.

By law, she cannot be re-tried for her son's murder.

Lodzinski had always professed her innocence and continually appealed her guilty verdict, which is how it got sent all the way to the state's highest court.

Essentially, the NJ Supreme Court said the Middlesex County Prosecutor did not prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Lodzinski murdered her son. None of her DNA was ever found by her son's skeleton.

Lodzinski and Timmy lived together in South Amboy at the time of his disappearance. Michelle had also once worked very close to the Raritan Center creek where his body was found.

However, no forensic or physical evidence — no DNA, fiber, or trace evidence — was ever found that tied Lodzinski to her son's death.

The strongest piece of evidence the state presented was the boy's blanket, found near his body.

But the judges said that blanket did not prove criminality.

"The court concludes that no rational jury — without engaging in speculation or conjecture — could conclude that Lodzinski purposely or knowingly caused Timothy's death," wrote the Supreme Court in their public judgement, which you can read here.

The highest court in the state appears to argue that Lodzinski did "have some involvement in his disappearance, death and burial," leaving it open that she may have indirectly caused her son's death.

But they said the Middlesex County Prosecutor's office did not prove murder, which is intentional.

NJ Supreme Court split on Lodzinski's guilt

"We may never know the truth about what happened in this case," wrote Justice Barry Albin in his opinion.

The New Jersey Supreme Court is made up of seven judges. The ruling vacating Lodzinski's murder charge was written by Hon. Albin, and sided with by Hons. Jaynee LaVecchia, Fabiana Pierre-Louis and Jose Fuentes.

However, three judges, Judges Anne Patterson, Faustino Fernandez-Vina and Lee Solomon dissented, saying that her murder conviction should have been upheld and she should remain in prison.

The tragic, unsolved death of a 5-year-old New Jersey boy

With the Supreme Court's decision to overturn his mother's murder conviction, the death of Timothy Wiltsey yet again pivots back to being one of New Jersey's saddest, most frustrating unsolved mysteries.

When the boy first went missing, Michelle took a vacation to the Bahamas. Michelle showed no emotion at her son's funeral, relatives said during her trial.

Searches of her house, her car and her garbage generated no evidence of guilt. No one ever observed Lodzinski abuse Timothy. Finally, no witness could say where, when, or precisely how Timothy died.

The death of the little boy immensely frustrated the New Jersey police officers who worked on his case. Some have said years later they are "haunted" by what happened to little Timmy and how justice was never truly served. Tune to "Dateline" on NBC Friday night at 9 p.m.

Ongoing Patch reporting on the death of Timothy Wiltsey:

High Court Overturns Lodzinski's Murder Conviction In Son's Death (Dec. 28, 2021)

Convicted Child Killer Michelle Lodzinski Sues Middlesex County, Says She Fell While In Handcuffs (2018)

Michelle Lodzinski Sentenced to 30 Years in Prison for Murder of Son, 5 (2017)

Michelle Lodzinski Said She 'Wasn't Made' to be a Mother, Witness Testifies (2016)

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