Creek remained unidentified for approximately one year, and it was not until April 2014 that police arrested a suspect, James Eaton, a native of Palatine.

She was described as a normal girl by friends and family until mid-1996, at around age 14, when her behavior drastically changed shortly after graduating from eighth grade at junior high school.

[3][4][5] Creek became a ward of the state in late 1996 and ran away several times before finally leaving a North Side juvenile residential center for good on January 23, 1997.

[10] She had been extensively physically abused, including being beaten and raped, slashed in the facial area, and bitten on the neck causing compression which played a role in her death.

[17][18] Police reportedly spent thousands of hours comparing DNA, dental records and fingerprints to many different missing person cases.

[19][20][21] After viewing the television show America's Most Wanted that aired in December 1998, which documented the case, Creek's father had notified police that he suspected that the body belonged to his daughter.

[24] In February 2014, Creek's case was reopened; examiners in an Oklahoma crime lab were able to match a thumbprint on the garbage bag concealing the body to James Paul Eaton, a 36-year-old divorced man.

[12][24][31] Investigators located the suspect in Chicago, and on March 22 they collected discarded cigarette butts to match his DNA to that found at the crime scene.

[33] Authorities also looked through his computer, Facebook profile and phone, as well as searching his residence for possible souvenirs from the scene, as some of Amber's belongings had been suspected to have been taken by her killer.

[15][35] Eaton's original charges consisted of first-degree murder and concealing a body, which carried a sentence of life in prison.

[11][36] However, the final pretrial conference and trial were later delayed to May 31 and June 6, 2016, respectively, as the defense was attempting to locate an individual to examine the bite mark on Creek's neck as well as the DNA from the scene.