Death of Lynn Messer

Lynn Marie Messer was an American woman who was last seen alive in the Bloomsdale, Missouri, farmhouse she shared with her husband during the early hours of July 8, 2014. Her disappearance generated both national and international news coverage. Her remains were found on the edge of the farm where she lived on November 1, 2016. Disappearance: At approximately 4:00 a.m. on July 8, 2014, Kerry Messer woke up to find that his wife Lynn wasn't in bed beside him. He looked around the house for her, noticing that Lynn's personal belongings - including her ID, passport, wallet, cell phone, car keys, and the walking boot she used to help protect her broken toe - were all still in the house. Kerry checked the areas around their farm where Lynn would normally be as well as the gravel pathways and roads leading to their farmhouse, and began checking locations beyond the farm that morning before his son called the sheriff's office. After 10 months of cooperation and over 40 in-person and telephone visits with law enforcement, they refused to share where they were in the investigation. The last known communication Lynn had with anyone other than her husband Kerry was a phone call she made at 11:30pm on the night of July 7. Investigation: Police quickly classified Lynn as an "endangered person", given the fact that she had a broken toe at the time and left without her walking boot, leading police to speculate if she may have found herself in physical danger. Local police, using professional Search and Rescue, K-9 Teams, highway patrol, and even the FBI were called in to locate her. The Messer farmhouse was meticulously searched on the first day and on later dates by both local and federal authorities. Nothing has ever been found to indicate any harm or wrongdoing by her husband Kerry. Nor was there any indication of a break-in or struggle of any kind, leading police to believe that she hadn't been abducted. Neither the police nor Kerry believed that Lynn had decided to run away from home; she hadn't taken any personal belongings with her, she appeared to enjoy her marriage and family life, and she had recently been discussing exciting future plans such as holidays and Bible classes. After four days of intensive searching, the local Sheriff said he was convinced that Lynn was not on the farm. The official search was suspended and law enforcement supported the family as they took up the searching. One of Kerry and Lynn Messer's sons and one of her brother-in-laws took over directing volunteer search teams for the next 125 days, expending thousands of man-hours in the search for Lynn Messer. It was later revealed that Lynn Messer had left a note prior to her disappearance, but the note's contents have yet to be released to the public. Kerry Messer had provided it to the Sheriff's personnel but has said only that "It was some kind of note of finality, but I don't know what that means and to this day I don't understand it." In the first four days law enforcement directed the search of the farm and key surrounding areas. From that point friends and family organized the search parties beyond the farm to try to find Lynn. However, all efforts proved unsuccessful. In the months following Lynn's disappearance, over 5,000 acres (2,000 ha) of land were searched, missing posters were posted in Ste. Genevieve county and its surrounding counties, and a Facebook page was set up in order to try and find her. Police sorted through tips that were coming in, but none of the tips provided any useful leads. As hunting season approached, Kerry created a new not-for-profit educational program, "Support The Hurting", urging hunters, hikers, and other outdoor enthusiasts to be on the lookout for anything suspicious in the woods. His new educational approach was to promote a simple three-step approach to report unusual items which hunters and others might typically ignore. The three-step rule is: "Don't Touch, Document Location, Report to Local Law Enforcement". Some people reported that they had seen women who looked like they could be Lynn, but when police investigated the tips further, they found that they were cases of mistaken identity. In November 2016, bones were discovered on the Messer Farm about a mile from the house. They are believed to be the remains of Lynn Messer due to eye glasses and artificial hips found with them. Shortly afterwards they were positively identified as her by means of dental records.