The police department also announced on Thursday a reward of up to $5,000 for information leading to an arrest or charges filed in Angela Leeann Mitchell's death.
"She didn't deserve to die," her mother, Georgia Mitchell, said. "She didn't deserve for someone to take her life. She's not a bad person."
Investigators were led to Mitchell's body after neighbors in the 400 block of 4th Street North called police at about 2:30 p.m. Wednesday regarding an odor coming from a white Honda that had been parked for days in the roadway, police said.
ORIGINAL STORY: Body of missing mom found in car trunk in Texas City, police say
The department's criminal investigations and identifications divisions were called out once officers detected the odor from the trunk, which was then opened and contained Mitchell's body.
People who live nearby said the car had been parked in the same spot since before Mother's Day.
The woman's cause of death remained pending, as of Thursday afternoon.
Before police released her identity, Mitchell's friends and family told Eyewitness News that they reported the mother of four children missing on May 6 after she didn't return home to Dickinson the night before.
"It had become 24 hours since my last contact with her," Georgia Mitchell said. "When I tried to find out why she didn't respond to me it went straight to voicemail and I couldn't track her on the locator on our phones anymore. I started getting sick to my stomach."
They had actually tracked her location to Texas City that same day, found her vehicle, but saw no sign of her.
"I met police officers at her vehicle here in Texas City after filing a missing person report and I begged them," Georgia Mitchell said. "I begged them to please search my daughter's car. 'Please search my daughter's car. Please investigate this'. I begged. I begged the police officers and they just dismissed me."
She said she did not suspect that her daughter was in the trunk but said she found it strange where the car was parked.
Shortly after police were called to the 4th Street neighborhood on Wednesday, Mitchell's friends and family said they were upset that it took investigators too long to take her case seriously.
ABC13 reached out to Texas City PD repeatedly Thursday to question how the investigation played out but were never able to reach anyone.
A police document said Mitchell's phone was last pinged to a home in the Lago Mar subdivision just before 10 p.m. on Thursday, May 5, and had not been active since.
Mitchell was a mother of four: a 9-year-old girl, 7-year-old boy, 3-year-old girl and 7-month-old son.
Georgia Mitchell said her children are too young to understand what is happening. She got upset talking about the 7-month-old who will never know his mother.
"Well he's going to know his mama," the children's grandmother said. "He is, because I am going to make sure. But the fact that he is not going to remember what a wonderful mother he had and how much she loved him -- I am going to make sure that he knows."
The investigation into Mitchell's death continues. Texas City police urged anyone with information to contact their Criminal Investigation Division at 409-643-5720, or to submit tips anonymously, you can contact Crime Stoppers at 409-945-TIPS (8477) or at p3tips.com.
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