Body Of Missing Mom Who Vanished After Fight With Boyfriend Found In Trunk Of Plateless Car

A missing upstate New York mother who vanished while visiting Queens to attend a funeral was found dead inside a plateless car this week.

Destini Smothers, 26, was visiting New York City from Troy to attend a funeral in November, NBC News reported last year. Two days before the funeral, she went out to celebrate her 26th birthday, then vanished. Smothers' boyfriend reportedly said that on Nov. 24 she got out of his car without any of her belongings after the pair got into a fight.  

On Wednesday morning, a body was discovered in Queens after a tow truck driver began relocating a plateless black 2011 Toyota, the New York Police Department told local station PIX11. While moving the car, a tow truck crew member noticed an issue with a tire, so pulled over to look for a spare in the trunk, NYPD Chief Reuben Beltran told WNBC. Inside, the body was found in a fetal position.

The NYPD confirmed to Oxygen.com on Friday via email that the body has been identified as Smothers.

The local medical examiner will determine the cause of death, police said. However, police reportedly told PIX11 that Smothers died of blunt impact injury to the head with a skull fracture and brain injury. The investigation is currently ongoing and her death is being investigated as a murder, authorities confirmed.

The owner of the plateless Toyota hasn't been determined by investigators, but family members of Smothers reportedly told PIX11 that her boyfriend was driving a similar car.

Smothers’ family could not immediately be reached on Friday, and the NYPD has not responded to Oxygen's inquiry about any possible suspects or persons of interest. No one has yet to be arrested or officially named a person of interest in the case.

Smothers is a mother of two. She lived in Troy with her boyfriend.

“We’re in shock,” Smothers’ cousin, Maurice Williams, told the New York Daily News. “We were hoping she would come back alive.”