In December 2018, shortly before Christmas, 31-year-old Emiley Tesch Hughes disappeared without a word, worrying her family and friends.
The mother of three lived with her husband, Edwards Hughes IV, in a mobile home in Crescent City, California.
In May 2026, her best friend, Jade Castanede, revealed her side of the story about everything that happened leading up to Emiley’s disappearance, as well as the “haunting” text messages she received from her number afterward.
“Nothing can make this right,” Jade said about the fate that befell Emiley, which they did not learn for weeks after she went missing.
Emiley received a “red flag” warning from Jade about her future husband, Edward
Image credits: The Del Norte County Sheriff’s Office
On May 18, 2026, in a self-authored article for the Daily Mail, Jade Castanede shared the story of meeting Emiley, their decade-long friendship, and how things changed after the latter’s marriage.
“I met Emiley through her ex when I was 17, and she was 20. We bonded over being raised by our grandmothers,” Jade wrote. Soon, they became close friends and even had their first kids within three months of each other in 2008.
By the end of 2014, Emiley had another child, a daughter, with a second man, but had broken up with him and was thriving as a grocery store department manager. She had paid off her car loan, bought a house, and was raising her kids well.
In 2016, Emiley met her future husband, Edward Hughes, whom Jade’s then-boyfriend personally knew.
Image credits: The Del Norte County Sheriff’s Office
“He used to date my sister. There’s something wrong with him,” Jade’s boyfriend warned her about Edward. “When they broke up, he humiliated her by peeing on her.”
Jade immediately passed the warning on to Emiley, calling his action a “red flag,” but Emiley was convinced that Edward was “a different person now.”
“I didn’t warm to him,” Jade said in the article, reminiscing about her first meeting with Edward. But she went along as the relationship seemed to make Emiley happy.
“Her tragedy was that she never saw her own worth and often fell for ab*sive men,” Jade wrote about Emily, adding that she was “generous to a fault.”
Edward accused Emiley of using illicit substances after her mysterious disappearance
Image credits: The Del Norte County Sheriff’s Office
Emiley and Edward got married at the end of February 2017. Before tying the knot, Edward asked Emiley to quit her job. She obliged, dismissing Jade’s concerns about Edward’s intentions, saying that Edward treated her like a “princess.”
By the time they married, Emiley had gone back to work at a gas station, as Edward’s wage from working at a lumber yard was not enough for their family.
“It all felt far too fast to me, but she seemed deeply in love,” Jade wrote. “During the actual ceremony, Edward seemed oddly on edge; he fidgeted, moving from one leg to another. But they got through the day and, as far as I knew, settled into married life together.”
Soon, Emiley had her third child, a son, fathered by Edward. Married life with three kids caused some distance between Emiley and Jade, but the latter felt like Edward was isolating his wife from her friends.
Image credits: KRCR NEWS
The two met for the last time on Jade’s 28th birthday in November 2018, when Emiley gifted her a piece of jewelry, but left before their other friends got to the party.
On December 26, 2018, a mutual friend told Jade that Emiley’s grandmother, Donna, had gone to visit her, but Edward said she was away visiting an unnamed friend. Jade messaged both Emiley and Edward to ask about their whereabouts. None replied.
The next day, when Jade said she would file a missing persons report, she received a reply from Emiley’s number saying she “needed a break” from her life. Shortly afterward, Edward started telling everyone that Emiley had started using narcotics and left him and her kids.
“I called Edward and confronted him, telling him: ‘Emily wouldn’t leave the kids. It doesn’t make sense.’ ‘She’s on dr*gs,’ he insisted, saying he’d heard she’d been seen in a town a couple of hours away.”
Emiley’s son discovered her decomposing remains in the closet
Image credits: Facebook
Jade continued texting Emiley in vain as Donna took in her eldest son, and another friend cared for her daughter. On January 7, 2019, Jade called Edward, offering to take in their then-14-month-old son for a few days, to give him a break.
“When Edward arrived, the youngest wore clothes far too big for him, and his skin was ice-cold.” Jade recalled in the article. “He clearly wasn’t being cared for. Edward told me he hadn’t heard from Emiley.”
On January 14, Jade had a puzzling text exchange with Emiley’s number, where the latter said, “I’m happy right now, and I know my babies are fine.” Jade wrote back, begging her to return, after which the replies stopped, but Jade’s follow-up messages kept being opened.
Jade and Donna first contacted the police on February 1, convinced that Edward had something to do with Emiley’s disappearance.
Image credits: The Del Norte County Sheriff’s Office
When the cops dismissed the situation, citing Jade and Emiley’s DM exchanges, she and Donna plastered their own missing persons poster all over town.
Jade finally learned what happened to Emiley on February 14, when Donna called her and said, “Jade, we found her. The bast*rd k*lled her. She’s in the closet.”
Donna had taken Emiley’s eldest to her Crescent City mobile home to collect some belongings when the boy opened the master bedroom closet and found his mother’s decomposing body wrapped in a sheet.
“Emiley was cremated, and there was a standing-room-only celebration of life service at a local church,” Jade wrote. “I sobbed my way through it.”
Edward Hughes was sentenced to 15 years in prison for his wife’s homicide
Image credits: The Del Norte County Sheriff’s Office
After Emiley’s remains were discovered, forensic findings concluded that she was fatally strangled on Christmas Eve of 2017, and her body was put in the closet after her demise.
“That meant she hadn’t been opening my messages, Edward had. Then, posing as her, he’d replied. It was sickening,” Jade wrote in the Daily Mail article.
The police found a fleeing Edward on February 19, 2019, and arrested him as the prime suspect after a three-hour siege on a Dell Lane residence. He was charged with homicide and was held on a $1 million bail by the Del Norte County Sheriff’s Office (DNSO).
Image credits: KRCR NEWS
On July 30, 2019, Edward stood trial before Judge Robert Cochran and pleaded not guilty.
During the trial, one of the investigating officers, DNSO Sgt. Jerron Gill testified that an acquaintance of Edward, Christopher Roberts, had seen him push his toddler son down, saying he wanted to “bash the baby’s head in.”
Sgt. Gill also said that Edward had multiple explanations for how his wife had passed away, including one where he claimed Emiley had struck him first and another where she had allegedly taken her last breath while sleeping. Eventually, he confessed to strangling her to a fatal end and said it was an accident.
Image credits: The Del Norte County Sheriff’s Office
According to Jade’s article, Edward was found guilty of second-degree homicide and child cruelty and jailed for 15 years to life in prison. He was also banned from seeing his youngest son for ten years, whom Jade wanted to adopt, but a blood relative of Emiley’s stepped forward.
“He’s eligible for parole in August 2028, nine-and-a-half years after his arrest,” Jade wrote. “That’s the value the justice system placed on my best friend — a mother of three.”
“This story is horrible.” The internet was in shock over the doomed fate of Emiley Hughes
