(NewsNation) — Two years after Jelani Day was found dead, his mother still wants to know what happened to her son and why authorities have not explained some evidence.

Jelani Day was missing for nearly two weeks when his body was pulled from five feet of water in the Illinois River on Sep. 4, 2021. He was wearing underwear, a T-shirt and had a jacket tied around his waist.

The body was so badly decomposed it would be nearly three weeks before he could be positively identified.

Despite a Jelani Day Joint Task Force being formed in December of 2021, made up of Peru, Illinois, police; the LaSalle County Sheriff’s Office; Bloomington, Illinois, police and the FBI, and an offer of a $10,000 reward, authorities are still no closer to answering the question of what happened to Jelani.

Carmen Bolden Day, Jelani’s mother, said when she asked questions, none of the agencies were aware of what the others were doing.

NewsNation made multiple interview requests with the departments, but they all declined. Peru police said the case is still under investigation.

The latest twist in the case comes as the task force was disbanded just last week, even though the case is not formally closed.

Carmen told NewsNation investigators informed her there were shoeprints near Jelani’s body, but he wasn’t wearing shoes when he was found. In fact, his clothing and shoes wouldn’t be found until weeks later.

She says investigators also confirmed DNA was recovered from the clothing, but it did not belong to Jelani.

“The clothing was found a mile up the river from where the body was found,” she said.

Jelani’s cellphone was found along a nearby highway the following month. Investigators told Carmen they could turn on the phone as soon as it was charged despite it sitting in the elements for weeks. But they wouldn’t crack the code to unlock it until almost a year and a half later in early 2023.

Carmen was ecstatic, thinking it might lead to answers, but she quickly found herself disappointed.

“They told me it’s only text messages to you, his siblings, his grandma. Nothing of significance on his phone, and that’s BS,” she said.

Carmen said that like most young people, her son was always on his phone. It was his lifeline from the beginning. She feels like authorities have implied her son’s death was a suicide.

“So you want me to believe that he parked his car, removed his license plates, walked through town, through a neighborhood, tossed his wallet, then went down to the river and put himself in the river and removed his clothes and drowned himself?” she said.

Carmen said police have told her there are no reports of a man walking through Peru, Illinois, that day, something she finds hard to believe.

Peru is a small, predominantly white town. Carmen said as a Black man, her son would stick out and likely be noticed, even if it wasn’t in a malicious way.

Two years has felt like a lifetime for a mother who said she is still living in a nightmare.

“I feel helpless sometimes,” she said. “Sometimes I feel okay, I’m making progress, and then in the next minute, I feel like I’m failing him.”

Carmen believes someone has more information about what happened to Jelani.

The reward for information is still being offered in the case as Carmen waits for answers to the unanswered questions.

She hopes she will get closure about what happened to her son.