By Daily Mail (U.S.) | Created at 2025-03-05 18:41:39 | Updated at 2025-03-06 03:19:54
9 hours ago
A Tennessee husband has shared the frantic text messages he sent his wife after she went missing, before she was found dead inside her car in a retention pond.
Michael Fundo, a private contractor based in Saudi Arabia, was overseas when his wife Kristen, 35, went missing in Cordova.
He had Facetimed Kristen just an hour before she vanished, having spoke with her while she ate at a restaurant with a friend last Friday.
As she left, he had been tracking her phone and became alarmed when she failed to respond to his text messages or phone calls. She then pulled up beside the pond.
Speaking with WREG, Fundo said it was around this time that her phone died, and the local sheriff's office received a call about a vehicle being submerged in the lake.
In the messages, Fundo frantically asks Kristen, 'you ok?', 'did you go back to her house?'.
After Kristen failed to reply the texts become more frantic, as Fundo says: 'Getting concerned now. Tried to call you twice', and 'now your phone is off? I'm definitely worried now!'
He adds: 'This is very abnormal babe, I'm stressed out right now! You better be OK!'
Michael Fundo, seen here alongside his late wife Kristen, had been overseas working when his wife disappeared
He had been tracking her phone and became alarmed when she failed to respond to his text messages or phone calls
The following day, he follows up with another text: 'If you get this, just know that Daniel is driving by that location to see if the truck is there.
'I'm so f***** freaked out right now.' On the Saturday, he then said: 'I love you. I hope you're ok. I'm panicking really bad!'
Sadly, Fundo's worst fears were realized shortly afterwards.
Shelby County Sheriff's deputies had responded to the scene on Grays Hollow Drive to a call of a vehicle actively sinking in a body of water.
The local fire department took a boat out into the pond and found the vehicle submerged in the water with Kristen's body inside.
According to the sheriff's department, there were no signs of foul play. The local medical examiner's office told Fundo there was no signs of trauma.
Investigators are still none the wiser as to how or why Kristen died, with further tests underway.
Speaking with WREG, he said: 'It was near my brother’s neighborhood. I don’t know if that is where she was trying to go. I called my brother to see if our car was there.'
His wife had been employed at Christ Methodist Day School, with their daughter attending a nearby elementary school.
Fundo told the outlet that the school had been supportive of his family and even waived his daughter's tuition.
An official cause of death has yet to be released, with Fundo saying he was still waiting on a toxicology report
Her vehicle was found submerged in a retention pond on Friday evening, after someone dialed 911 to report a vehicle entering the water
In a Facebook live he also said that he had now returned to Tennessee and added: 'No daughter should ever grow up without a mom.'
In a post to his Facebook, Fundo added: 'Unbelievable agony that you're gone. You were my life line, my happiness, my best friend.
'Your absence will forever affect our little girl and I for the rest of our life. Please watch over me, give me comforting words and touch my soul every chance you get.
'I will love you unconditionally forever, now and until the end of time.'
A GoFundMe has also been started to help the family with funeral and travel expenses.
A post to the fundraiser says: 'At this time we are trying to take the financial burden off the family to give them time and space to grieve.
'Any donations are helpful and no amount is insignificant. Kristen was a light in everyone's life.'
An official cause of death has yet to be released, with Fundo saying he was still waiting on a toxicology report.
