NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WKRN) – The mother of a songwriter found dead in a creek bed in East Nashville nearly seven years ago says they have renewed hope for closure in her daughter’s death.

While detectives continue investigating the death of Tess Carlson, her mother Carol Carlson said a recent call from a detective was promising.

“Her belief was deep…deep,” Carol explained of her daughter Tess.

Much like Tess’s spirit, Carol has faith.

“Tess was a very, very strong believer, too. She had faith. In fact, she wrote a song and named it ‘Faith,'” she said. 

Songwriting is what brought Tess, a former model and beauty queen, to Nashville in the 1990s. 

“She was a beautiful person inside and out, had these huge dreams, huge, huge dreams that she was, you know, a songwriter and that she kept striving for.”

Those dreams, however, came to an end for Tess when she was 46 years old.

Detectives said Tess was last seen alive around Halloween in 2016. Days later, a neighbor found her partially nude body in a dry creek bed on Sunnymeade Drive in East Nashville.

“She had defensive wounds on her arms and hands,” her mother said.

Toxicology results for Tess were clean, but her body was too decomposed to reveal a cause of death. Investigators said Tess battled mental health issues, but it is unclear if that played a role in her death.

Even with few clues, detectives have some ideas as to what happened, believing the creek bed was a dump site. Metro police said detectives with their Cold Case Unit recently took over the investigation.

“I did not know that her case was still open,” Carol said, adding that investigators are looking at a possible person of interest.

“It was a person she had met previously,” Carol explained. 

From the beginning, Carol’s motherly instincts have pointed to the killer as being someone her daughter trusted, believing this new information could finally bring closure to their grieving family.

“We will continue to look for them, listen for them. They will repeat bad things,” the mother warned, asking for anyone with information on her daughter’s death to come forward. 

If you have any information on what happened to Tess Carlson, call Crime Stoppers at 615-742-7463.