Desheena LaCole Kyle was 26 when she was last seen in Knoxville, Tennessee, on June 19, 2021, and officially reported missing on June 28. Family and friends mounted a months-long search before investigators located her body on September 28, 2021. Her remains were discovered concealed in a toolbox in the crawl space of an abandoned house on Sam Tillery Road, a property that had once belonged to the great-grandmother of her boyfriend, John Bassett. The manner of death was ruled a homicide.

Bassett, who had been taken into custody on an unrelated probation violation on July 7, became the focus of the investigation. Prosecutors later accused him of murdering Kyle and concealing her body; he testified that she had taken her own life and he had panicked. A jury convicted him on all counts, and he was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for Desheena’s murder. Desheena’s family described her as funny, outgoing, and loving.

Did anyone who knew Desheena or who was in the Sam Tillery Road neighborhood in summer 2021 see or hear anything that could add detail to her final days?