Detectives believe they’ve located the remains of a 15-month-old Tennessee girl who has been missing since late November or early December. The discovery was made Friday on a property belonging to a “family member of Evelyn’s mother,” according to Sullivan County Sheriff Jeff Cassidy.

“This is certainly not the update we had hoped to provide this evening,” Tenessee Bureau of Investigation spokeswoman Leslie Earhart said Friday.

Little Evelyn Boswell’s mother, 18-year-old Megan Boswell, was arrested on Feb. 25 for making false reports after giving conflicting statements to authorities as they looked for the child. An Amber Alert was issued for the missing child 17 days ago after it became clear her mother was not telling the truth.

“During the investigation we determined that some of the statements Megan Boswell provided to us were false,” Cassidy said. “Many of the false statements that Megan made delayed our investigation and also impeded our investigation on trying to find Evelyn.”

Before the discovery, Megan Boswell had first told officials that the tot was with her father, who is an active duty military officer stationed in Louisiana, and then claimed the girl’s grandmother had taken Evelyn. She said her mother and the child went camping “in a silver camper,” and promised, “I’m going to go find her myself.” Megan also claimed that she was newly pregnant and could not take a polygraph test.

Megan’s mother, Angela Boswell, and her boyfriend, 33-year-old William McCloud, were separately arrested in February in North Carolina and charged with possession of stolen property. Evelyn was first reported missing by her grandfather after he hadn’t seen the baby in several months.

The original headline of this piece incorrectly identified Evelyn Boswell as from Memphis. The Daily Beast regrets this error.