CORINTH – Authorities are awaiting autopsy results on the skeletal remains of a body found in a burned-out car identified as belonging to a missing Prentiss County woman.

The silver 2005 Pontiac Bonneville is the one Tammy Renee McVey Wright was driving the afternoon of March 25, when she was last seen visiting a patient at Magnolia Regional Health Center in Corinth, said Alcorn County Chief Deputy Tommy Hopkins.

The burned vehicle was found about 900 feet off Alcorn County Road 335 by people who came across it while riding a four-wheeler after a fishing outing near the washed-out road, he said.

The body has been sent to Jackson for the autopsy and positive identification.

“It had been there for some time, perhaps burned the day she disappeared,” Hopkins said.

The search for Wright, who lived in the Blackland Community of Prentiss County, began when family members reported her missing to a family member who is a deputy with the Prentiss County Sheriff’s Office, said Prentiss Sheriff Randy Tolar.

While Prentiss County began investigating, they also contacted Alcorn County. The Mississippi Bureau of Investigation also became involved because the search involved multiple jurisdictions.

Almost a month later, with no signs of her vehicle or contact from Wright, the Prentiss County Sheriff’s Office brought in a Tupelo Police Department helicopter to conduct an aerial search for the car, which yielded nothing.

Hopkins, Prentiss County Investigator Derrick Hester and the MBI agent will decide how the investigation will proceed, Tolar said Monday.

“What they will want to confirm is positively identifying her remains and hopefully determine a cause or means of death,” Tolar said. “Unless we can prove something happened somewhere else, jurisdiction is in Alcorn County.”

Contact Lena Mitchell at 287-9822 or lena.mitchell@journalinc.com.