CHICAGO — The last time Mariely Rivera’s daughter was in her house, she got in her mother’s bed, laid down next to her and hugged her.

“Mom, I have made my decision,” her daughter said. “I’m going to go back with him.”

Stephanie Gutiérrez was 20 — an adult — and all her mother could do was ask her to think about what she was doing. Gutiérrez shared a 1-year-old son with a partner who, according to Rivera, abused her.

Soon after, she was back with her boyfriend and texted a friend: “I’m so sad I swear I should’ve never (came) back sis.”

Two days later, Gutiérrez was dead.

On Oct. 30, 2022, Chicago police officers were called to the 6800 block of West Grand Avenue on the city’s Northwest Side, according to a police report. They found Gutiérrez unresponsive on a sidewalk suffering from a gunshot wound.

Detectives immediately noticed something wrong with the scene, according to police records. Even though Gutiérrez was found outside, it was clear the shooting happened inside the home.

Her boyfriend told detectives that Gutiérrez was hit by a bullet fired from a vehicle in a drive-by shooting, according to a summary of a police interview obtained by the Tribune. When detectives confronted him with evidence that pointed to an indoor shooting, the boyfriend asked for a lawyer.

More than three years have since passed. Heartbroken, Rivera has waited for charges that have not come.

She is not alone — though the Chicago Police Department reached a 71% homicide clearance rate last year, that means almost 1 in 3 families have yet to see justice for their loved ones. The cleared figure also includes older cases that police believe they solved in prior years.

Rivera’s daughter’s case, like many others, is considered cleared because detectives submitted it to prosecutors, even though it was rejected for charges in 2024.

That leaves Rivera with a case caught in a legal knot: Detectives consider the case solved, even though there has been no prosecution.

Prosecutors say they have a high burden to meet when charging criminal cases: They must be able to prove in court, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the defendant committed the alleged offense.

In the Gutiérrez case, prosecutors conducted an “extensive review” of the evidence presented by police in 2024 and declined charges, finding that “the evidence did not meet the burden of proof required to approve criminal charges,” according to a statement from their office.

The prosecutors told the family of their decision that year, according to Rivera and the office.

Now Rivera just hopes to keep her daughter’s homicide case alive. On June 20, her attorney sent a letter to former First Assistant State’s Attorney Anna Demacopoulos asking the office to take a fresh look at the case.

“The Cook County State’s Attorney Office under Eileen O’Neill Burke has committed to prioritizing public safety and taking a firm stance against domestic violence,” the letter said.

The attorney later also wrote to Demacopoulos’ replacement, but the family is still waiting and hoping for any possible movement on the case.

Attempts to reach the boyfriend, who the Tribune is not naming because he has not been charged, were not successful. Messages left at phone numbers for the boyfriend and his mother and an email sent to a former attorney were not returned.

The boyfriend has prior convictions in Cook County for burglary, fleeing police and possessing a stolen vehicle. The alleged domestic abuse does not appear to have been reported to police.

“It’s a feeling of like frustration and anger,” Rivera said, and in her view, “knowing that he’s just out there getting away with murder.”

‘She had a good heart’

Gutiérrez was the second oldest of six children. A young mother, she was enamored with her son, Josiah.

“In my head I always have her as kissing him,” Rivera said. “I always have that in my mind.”

Gutiérrez loved being in the sun, and often wrote her mother little notes for Valentine’s Day or other occasions.

You couldn’t complain about other people in front of her, Rivera said. Her daughter hated when people talked about others behind their backs.

She liked to eat out, particularly spicy chicken wings.

“She had a good heart,” Rivera said.

She met her boyfriend in high school and the relationship was troubled, her mother said.

Family members provided dental records that show that Gutiérrez was treated on Nov. 19, 2021, for a broken tooth. In the letter to Demacopoulos, the family said Gutiérrez told a friend that her boyfriend punched her and knocked one out.

The summer before she was killed, Rivera said her daughter broke up with her boyfriend because he hit her. Rivera said she noticed a bruise on her daughter’s face and wanted to confront him.

“Mom, don’t tell him anything,” Rivera said her frightened daughter told her.

Gutiérrez moved back home for a time, but was pulled back to the father of her child. Her mother was deeply concerned.

“I couldn’t do anything but tell her, just think about it,” Rivera said.

Later, in text messages to a friend, Gutiérrez said she regretted going back to her boyfriend.

“He been beating my ass since I got here calling me all type of (expletive),” she texted on Oct. 28, 2022. “I’m finna leave.”

“Today,” she added.

But in two days, police would find her dead on the sidewalk.

The investigation

When the officers arrived, they found her boyfriend standing near her, according to a police report, shirtless and covered with blood.

The report noted that a witness reported seeing the boyfriend drag her out to the sidewalk.

Gutiérrez was wearing black leggings and a black hooded jacket, according to an autopsy report. She had mismatched socks and white polish on her toes.

Gutiérrez was pronounced dead on the scene around 3:20 a.m., and her boyfriend was taken into custody. Hours later, around 7:30 a.m., detectives interviewed the boyfriend with a prosecutor present, according to a fact sheet that summarizes the encounter.

The boyfriend first said that he and Gutiérrez were getting ready to leave the home and walk out the door when someone in a car drove by and let off some shots. He said the front door was not open.

Detectives then told him that there was no damage to the front door, according to the summary.

Actually, the boyfriend said, they were outside, and Gutiérrez was shot on the sidewalk.

The investigators then told the boyfriend that the evidence points to Gutiérrez being shot indoors. Inside the home, a pool of blood was on the living room floor, and a live round was found in a McDonald’s bag in the apartment, records show.

There were no cartridge casings or blood outside.

The boyfriend asked for a lawyer and the interview ended.

The detectives then spoke with the three other people in the home early that morning: the boyfriend’s sister and her partner, as well as a friend, records show. The friend told police that he was drinking and listening to music with Gutiérrez and her boyfriend, according to a summary of the interview.

He said the boyfriend was flashing a gun. Later, he dozed off, then awoke to the boyfriend yelling, he reported.

He said he came out of the bedroom, and saw the boyfriend holding Gutiérrez. There was blood everywhere.

The sister and her partner were asleep, and reported to police that they woke up to pounding on their door. According to the summary of the police interviews, they saw the boyfriend dragging Gutiérrez out to the sidewalk.

Quest for justice

On the morning of Oct. 30, Mariely Rivera was watching her infant grandson and trying to get hold of her daughter, hoping to drop the boy off before her hair appointment.

She couldn’t reach her daughter, and drove by the house. The lights were on, but it was empty, so she took the baby to her appointment.

That’s where she got the phone call that changed her life and set her on a path seeking justice for her daughter.

Her other daughter called her and told her detectives had come to their door. She put the investigator on the phone who told her the news. She heard her daughter scream on the other end of the phone call.

“My whole body went numb,” she said. “I couldn’t even cry.”

Autumn turned to winter and Rivera began learning how to live with the pain. She has custody of her daughter’s son, who now knows Rivera as “mommy,” even as she keeps her daughter alive for him, taking him on graveside visits.

The early days and months were particularly difficult, Rivera said, because the boy was so attached to his mother. All the while, Rivera waited for an arrest.

“I was thinking there was going to be an arrest,” she said. “There were only four people with her that day.”

By 2023, she hired a lawyer, whose private investigator did a number of interviews, including with friends and family members who reported that they noticed signs of abuse or that Gutiérrez disclosed past abuse.

Rivera told the Tribune she met in 2024 with a prosecutor in the state’s attorney’s office’s Felony Review Unit, who told her no charges would be filed.

Last year, Rivera hired a new attorney, Matt Fakhoury, a former Cook County prosecutor himself, who made pleas to Demacopoulos and her successor, Craig Engebretson, to further investigate whether charges could be filed.

“This is the type of case she specifically wanted to be state’s attorney for,” Fakhoury said of Burke, who took over from her predecessor Kim Foxx two years after Gutiérrez was killed. “This is a domestic violence case with a gun.”

The letter to Demacopoulos also argues that the facts support a charge of concealing a homicide, alleging that the boyfriend moved her body outside to “stage a false narrative of a drive-by shooting.”

More recently, in November, Fakhoury wrote to Engebretson saying the family “is extremely anxious” about the investigation.

In response to questions from the Tribune, the state’s attorney’s office said it is open to “reviewing any new or additional evidence related to this incident that is presented by law enforcement.”

“The CCSAO recognizes the profound impact that acts of violence have on victims and their families. Our decisions are guided by the law, the facts and our responsibility to pursue justice with integrity and accountability,” the office said.

Rivera said she is not giving up. She’s written letters and even taken to TikTok.

“I feel like there’s no help,” she said. “There’s nothing you can do.”

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