The body of a mother who went missing in Tennessee was found in the trunk of a crashed car being driven by her girlfriend in Michigan, police say.
Eleni Kassa, 31, was reported missing on Friday, Nov. 18, after she did not pick up her daughter from school, according to the Murfreesboro Police Department in Tennessee.
An investigation revealed she went missing following a “possible domestic violence incident” with her girlfriend, 36-year-old Dominique Hardwick, police said. Kassa’s phone and car were left at her apartment, and she was believed to be traveling with Hardwick in her black Dodge Charger.
Officers in Dearborn, Michigan, located the Charger on Sunday, Nov. 27, according to Michigan State Police. Officers tried to pull over the vehicle, but the driver fled and crashed into a home, police said.
As police gave verbal warnings to the driver of the vehicle, they heard a gunshot come from the Charger, police said. The driver, later determined to be Hardwick, was pronounced dead at the scene from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to police.
Officers found Kassa dead in the trunk of the Charger with injuries that were “not a result (of) the crash,” police said. It’s unclear how she died.
A front-seat passenger, whose identity was not publicly disclosed, was also in the vehicle, according to police. She was hospitalized, and police later said she was being interviewed regarding Kassa’s death.
Kassa was described in a GoFundMe as a “loving sister, niece, aunt and mother of a wonderful 6-year-old daughter.”
“She’s a wonderful mother, and she is a wonderful sister, and she’s just everybody’s favorite person,” her brother, Micky Ghirmay, told WKRN.
