Crime Weekly - S3 Ep346: The Case of Megan Trussell | CU Boulder Student Found Dead in Boulder Canyon (Part 1)

Episode Date: October 3, 2025

Megan Trussell, an 18-year-old University of Colorado Boulder student, was reported missing on February 12, 2025 after last being seen leaving her dorm on February 9. Her body was found just a few days later in remote area near Boulder Canyon, and after an investigation, the Boulder County Coroner’s Office and the Sheriff’s Office ruled her death a suicide. Though Megan's toxicology reports show medications had been in her system at the time of death, the rest of her autopsy tells a chilling story, and her family is fighting to get her case reopened. Try our coffee!! - www.CriminalCoffeeCo.com Become a Patreon member -- > https://www.patreon.com/CrimeWeekly Shop for your Crime Weekly gear here --> https://crimeweeklypodcast.com/shop Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/CrimeWeeklyPodcast Website: CrimeWeeklyPodcast.com Instagram: @CrimeWeeklyPod Twitter: @CrimeWeeklyPod Facebook: @CrimeWeeklyPod ADS: 1. https://www.HungryRoot.com/CrimeWeekly - Use code CRIMEWEEKLY for 40% off and a FREE item for life!

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Please play responsibly. If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connix Ontario at 1866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. But MGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming Ontario. On the night of February 9, 2025, 18-year-old Megan Trussle was last seen walking across the CU Boulder campus. It was cold, and she wasn't wearing a heavy coat, leading her family to believe she was on her way to get a diet Coke or visit her sister who lived near. But hours later, her phone stopped working, and she was never seen again. Nearly a week later, Megan's body was discovered in Boulder Canyon, just feet from where

volunteers had searched two days earlier. She was lying on snow-covered rocks, dressed in the same clothes she had been seen wearing that night, but with injuries that raised far more questions than answers. And as investigators began to reconstruct Megan's final hours, troubling questions surfaced, Not only about how she ended up in the canyon, an area she had never gone to willingly, but also about what was found and what was missing at the scene. Hello, everybody. Welcome back to Crime Weekly. I'm Stephanie Harlow.

And I'm Derek Labasser. So today we're diving into a new case. news series. And this one's kind of close to our hearts because when we were at CrimeCon in Denver a few weeks ago, by the time this comes out, definitely a few weeks ago, when we were there, we talked to the parents of Megan Trussell. We learned about the case. Derek actually covered Megan's case on Detective Perspective. We're going to be covering it more in depth. But we even did a live podcast episode, which I'm sure many of you have seen, where we touched on the case where Megan's mother was able to kind of clear things up and talk a little bit

to the crowd herself. And we asked everybody in that room, do you want us to cover this on Crime Weekly in a deep dive? And it was a pretty unanimous decision that they did. And I agree because this case needs more attention to it. And it needs to be reopened, reinvestigated, and looked at again by a fresh set of eyes, hopefully. Agreed. Yeah, I'm frustrated by this case after reviewing it, looking into it. I don't see how you rule this a suicide based on the evidence we have. And I don't see how you don't rule it as a homicide based on the outside evidence that has now come in involving other parties who were found with different items, et cetera. We covered this not extensively on the live podcast. If you caught that on Crime Weekly

News, this is going to be for you, for the people who've already heard that part, who have already her detective perspective and for someone who's coming into it fresh. This first episode is going to be more of the exposition. I'm not going to weigh in on it too much because I'm actually going to try and do something on this series, which is not spoils shit. There's actually not a ton of exposition in this first episode. We get in. We get into it.

Okay. Yeah, we get in. But I still, I don't want to get ahead of Stephanie because I tend to do that when I know the case because I get all excited. But yes, overall, as a father, I can only put myself in the shoes of Joe and Vanessa. Megan's parents and how frustrated I would be, I'd be burning down the, I'd be burning down the state of Colorado to figure out what happened to my daughter. And I was inspired by Vanessa. I had initially offered to match their reward for information leading to a arrest, which was

$1,000. So I was going to match it with $1,000. And Vanessa called me out when we were at crime con and I said, you know what? Actually, I'm so confident in this one. And I think there is information out there. One thousand didn't work. So let's try $5,000. So right now, if someone comes forward with information that leads to an arrest in Megan's case, I'm going to give you $5,000. Plus, there's another $1,000. So I'm putting my money where my mouth is. Vanessa knew to appeal to Derek's ego and his competitive side.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. I think there's something here. And if it's not going to be coming forward for the right reasons, maybe there's a financial incentive, just to give a little bit here. I'm sorry, I have to do it. There's a possibility that someone within the homeless community is aware of what happened. and so I'm hoping by attaching some money to it, maybe they'll come forward. Maybe that's what it's going to take.

And whatever it takes is what I'm willing to do. So I won't say anything else. You know what? Maybe I'll match it as well. Let's do it. Well, I love that. Yeah. $10,000.

I think that's, I think that can move the mark. $10,000 is a lot of money. And again, we just need someone to come forward and say, hey, this is what I know because that one little lead could be the reason they reopen the case. And if it leads to an arrest, we will gladly pay it. No questions asked. Absolutely. So there you go.

That's breaking news. I didn't even know that. So thank you, Stephanie. So Joe and Vanessa are going to be seeing this for the first time as well. We're up to $11,000, basically. Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, there was a lot of people at CrimeCon that really opened their arms and their hearts to Megan's parents and, you know, offered to add money to the pool as well.

Oh, you know what I'm thinking about right now. I'm not going to say the name of the gentleman because I don't. think he wanted to me to, but right after our live show, a gentleman and his wife, who came up to us before the Clue Awards, walked up to Vanessa, wrote her a check for five grand. Yeah. No questions asked. People are putting money where their mouth is in CrimeCon. Yeah, for sure.

So there you go. What a way to start this series, $11,000 reward for information leading to an arrest in Megan's case. That's how confident we are that she did not kill herself. And there's much more to this story. Yeah, there's not a thought in my mind. No shot. goes along with Megan did this to herself.

Correct. It's absolutely ludicrous. I'm stunned that any law enforcement body would say this with their chest and a straight face. And we really want to see a change happen here. So, yeah, we're definitely willing to. Love that. I love it.

Crime Weekly, putting their money where their mouths are. Yep. All right. Let's do it. Let's get into it. Let's get started. All right. Megan Piper Trussell was born on September 12th, 2006 in Denver, Colorado to parents

Vanessa Diaz and Joseph Trussell. She grew up alongside her older sister, Lindsay, and the four of them shared a close bond. Even when Vanessa and Joe divorced during Megan's teenage years, they continued to co-parent closely, and Megan remained connected to both of them. She was also especially close with her aunts, uncles, and her cousin, Isabella. So Joe and Vanessa told us that from the time she was little, Megan had a very sharp sense of humor. Joe described her as having a, quote, gifted level sarcasm gene, end quote, long before she fully understood sarcasm. chasm itself. He said he realized he had a prodigy's smart ass on his hands, and instead of

discouraging it, he leaned in and encouraged her wit. That humor paired with her empathy, gave her a natural ability to connect with people she loved. She had a way of making them feel understood, and with her quick perspective and warmth, Megan made everyone around her feel like her best friend. Joe said, quote, so she was very unique. I don't know if quirky's the right word, but very much her own person. She was encouraged by her mother and I to fly her flag, whatever that was. We gave her really just a broad range, to be herself, to develop into the kind of person she wanted to be. And quote, and Megan fully embraced that freedom. She liked to dye her hair in different colors, often with Lindsay's help. She played bass guitar and had an eclectic

taste in music. She collected vintage CDs, many passed down from her parents, and had a particular love for grunge from the 90s. She treasured her physical CDs so much that when her father Joe rebuilt a Volkswagen for her, the first thing she asked after climbing in was where the CD player was. He had installed a $1,000 stereo with Bluetooth, but no slot for CDs, so he ended up adding a cheap CD player just to make sure that Megan could listen the way she loved. And yeah, Megan sounds like a cool girl. She sounds like somebody I would have liked to have been friends with. The love of music, the love of the vintage CDs, the sarcastic wit, kind of masking the truly empathetic and sensitive person she was underneath. This is somebody I can relate to.

And she definitely had her own style. She had her own personality. She knew what she wanted to project to the world because she was just being authentic in every way. And she was projecting what was truly inside of her. And I love people like that. Movies were another passion of Megan's. She had been watching them with her father, Joe, since she was little, and she especially loved whodunits. She and her dad watched Knives Out more than 40 times together, and she also enjoyed classics like Murder on the Orient Express, Clue, and Death on the Nile, some of my favorites as well. She also had a soft spot for Mike Myers, the actor, not the serial killer, not Michael Myers, Mike Myers. Maybe she liked Michael Myers, too. So I married an axe murderer,

was one of her all-time favorite movies, and she enjoyed campy comedies like The Birdcage. I love the birdcage. It's such a good movie. But nothing compared to Scott Pilgrim versus the world. Megan adored the character Ramona Flowers, and when she couldn't find a purse like the one Ramona carried, which was a canteen-style crossbody with a star emblem,

Vanessa, her mother, decided to make it for her. Vanessa, she actually sews as a hobby, she went through six prototypes before she found the right vinyl fabric. Megan had chosen the colors herself, blue with a hot pink star, and Vanessa even bought a special sewing machine that could handle 15 layers of denim so that the seams would last. The finished purse became Megan's constant companion, and she always wore the strap over her right shoulder. She loved it so much she called it her security blanket.

And really what I'm getting from this is Megan's got a great family. She's got great parents. They're supportive. They're interactive with what she likes. They go out of their way to make her happy because she was a good kid, a good daughter. I mean, we know that for certain. We got the chance to meet them. And just how knowledgeable they are about this case.

I mean, I think most parents become very, they become their own detectives, right? But you can just tell, you can feel the love even before this tragedy, making that purse for, for Megan. We're going to talk about it more. But, yeah, this was a good family. They loved each other and they supported their daughter while also giving her. her freedom. Yeah. And it just seems like, you know, a lot of parents might not have done that. They'd be like, oh, well, we'll find one to buy. You know, we're not going to take all our time and go through all these prototypes and get a special sewing machine. And, you know, Megan's mom was

like, yeah, I'm going to do whatever it takes to get you this purse because I know how much it means to you, how happy it would make you. How happy it would make you. And Joe and Vanessa loved to see Megan happy. So in the spring of 2024, Megan Greta, graduated from Northfield High School, and even in her graduation photos, she was carrying her special signature purse. That fall, she was accepted at CU Boulder to study film. And CU Boulder is a public university, but it's often described as a public Ivy, meaning it's considered to offer an experience on the same level as the Ivy League. Nearly 40,000 students attend each year, many of them from affluent families. So Megan's living a great life at this

point. She's graduating. She's getting to go to college to study what she loves, which is film, and her life's unraveling the way she kind of expected it to in the best way possible. And that summer before she left her school, Megan and her father, Joe, spent their time watching every movie he could think of. When the summer ended, she moved into the dorms in Boulder. And Joe said he was confident she would do well. He'd always described her as a smart ass and too smart for her own good and he believed she would thrive in the college environment. And she did. As always, she embraced her freedom. She found her place quickly and was really coming into her own. During her first week, Megan texted Joe after her film class. And she wrote, quote, I had my first

film class. They want me to go home and watch a movie and then write what I think about it. College rules, end quote. And this is funny because Megan's like, this is what I already do. I already watch movies. And I may not be writing about them, but I'm talking to my friends about them. I'm talking to my dad about them. So basically, I just get to do for homework, what I love to do already, college rules. You know, it's awesome. Megan made new friends right away at college, and she also reconnected with her best friend from elementary school when they ran into each other on campus. It was meaningful because they had ended up going to different high schools, and now they had the chance to spend time together again. Megan didn't have a car, but her sister Lindsay lived

nearby and they saw each other often. She also continued to see her parents several times a month. Her first semester went by quickly, and in January of 2025, she started her second semester. She enrolled in photography for non-majors, an introduction to screenplay, and two other courses that she really enjoyed. By this point, Megan was dating a guy she had met at college a few months earlier. She started telling Vanessa about this guy in October, and after winter break, the relationship became more serious. On Saturday, February 8th, Megan told Vanessa she planned to spend the next day, which was Super Bowl Sunday, with her new boyfriend. They also talked about her cousin Isabella's upcoming birthday on February 27th, which Megan was excited about.

Vanessa didn't text Megan on Sunday, February 9th. She was trying to give her space. At the start of the week, she sent Megan a picture of her cat, Torali, but Megan didn't read it or reply. And Vanessa thought that was strange. Megan always responded. Now, at that same time, Joe was trying to text both Megan and Lindsay to set up plans to go out and grab food together. But once again, Megan didn't respond. And of course, this is going to seem odd.

And I completely understand why. My daughter is 23 years old. She's almost 24. She has moved out of the house recently to a different state. We still keep in touch often. And for instance, she just texted me right before we started filming this. And she said, hey, I'm going to be at a cabin for a few days. And there's not good service there.

So if you don't hear from me, don't freak out because she knows I freak out. If I text her and she doesn't respond because she always responds. You know your kid. You know their patterns. If you have a kid who kind of takes a week to answer a text, which is probably the kind of kid I am, then you know that. And if you have a kid who responds right away and lets you know what they're doing so that you don't worry because they know that you do worry, you understand that. And so Megan not responding when she's always been responsive, when she's always been in touch. That was odd.

So on Wednesday, February 12th, Vanessa, Joe, and Lindsay realized that no one had heard from Megan since the 9th. She hadn't responded to any messages from any of them, which was completely unlike her. So Vanessa went online to look at Megan's cell phone records and saw there had been no activity since the night of February 9th. And at that moment, she just knew in her heart something bad had happened to her daughter Megan. Megan's father, Joe, then looked into Megan's bank account and found there had been no activity on her debit card since February 9th. While Vanessa began calling and texting every number she could find in Megan's phone logs, but no one had heard from Megan. One of the first people she reached out to was Megan's roommate.

We're not going to use her real name, so we're going to call her Hannah. Hannah hadn't mentioned to anyone that Megan was missing, and Vanessa said Hannah showed no concern at all, simply telling her that she hadn't seen Megan since the evening of February 9th. When Vanessa confronted her for showing no urgency, Hannah responded that she would check the bathrooms. Vanessa couldn't believe this response. She thought to herself, quote, you think she's just been in the bathroom for three days?

End quote. Yeah, totally valid. Now, we're not saying that the roommate has any nefarious intent here. We're not saying the roommate did anything wrong. But you've shared a dorm room with this person. You've shared a living space, a common living space with this person for a while now. And the fact that you have not seen her in three days, it didn't occur to you to tell someone to, you know, did Hannah try texting Megan? Did Hannah try reaching out to Megan? Do we know

this? Yeah. So I don't know how much in the weeds are going to go here. So I don't want to steal your thunder. If you don't go there, I will. But there were some things that had happened between Megan and a roommate that kind of led to this separation between them. They weren't on the best of terms at the time that Megan disappeared. Also, I will say, just living at college myself, I originally went to college with someone I considered my best friend. We had never lived together. And then once we did, I realized that he liked the room to be super cold. So it's the middle of the winter, and he's got a fan in the window on.

I actually got really sick. And so I told him like, hey, dude, I'm playing baseball. I can't even go to practice. Probably had like a stiff neck. I had like bronchitis. And I'm like, hey, I needed to be warmer in here. So I woke up one. And he's like, yep, no problem.

I wake up one morning. and it's like four or five in the morning and there's literally smoke coming out of my mouth because it's so cold in the room. It's not smoke. It's like fog. Whatever it is. You could see your breath.

I could see my breath. And I was livid and not even going to lie to you guys. I stood up. I jumped off the top bunk because I was on the top bunk of the dorm room. And I kicked the fan out the third floor window and then I went back to sleep.

And that was the end of our relationship. Knowing you, I believe that 100%. So I say all that to say, we were in the same room together but there was a point for the rest of that semester where I wouldn't have known if he was gone for three days

in fact I was praying I didn't see him for three days so. You were like please can I thaw this popsicle I'd be gone. Yes, yes. The room was warm for those three days. I'll say that.

But no, there is more to the story between Megan and a roommate. Maybe you're going to get there and if you don't, I'll come back to it. We definitely will, but I would still be curious to know and I'm going to ask Megan's mother.

Did Hannah try to reach out to Megan during those three days. A call or text. She did not. Nothing. That's weird to me because I get it. Maybe you had an argument, your roommate left, but you'd still want to make sure she was okay, right?

You'd be like, I'm mad at you still, but like, are you okay? Like, are you alive? Because you've never left for three days. I mean, they were new to each other. This was the first semester. Yeah. I don't think she felt the obligation. I just don't.

I feel that obligation, though, when I see just like girls on the street who are drunk and stumbling and I want to like. Like I said, with my roommate, if he had been gone, for three days, I would have assumed that he was with someone else staying in their room. I wouldn't have called home, even though I knew his family and said, hey, you know, I haven't seen this person in three days. So I'm giving this person, though, the roommate, a little bit of grace. And I will say right now, just to bury it, nobody believes that her roommate had anything

to do with her disappearance. We're just discussing it and what could have been different and maybe closed up the timeline of the disappearance if she had been reported missing sooner. Yeah. So what could have been different, in my opinion, is I don't care. if you're fighting with your roommate, if you're mad at your roommate, you have a code. Girls got to look out for each other. Did you ever live at school?

Yes. You lived at college? Yes. And I had roommates and I didn't like any of them. That doesn't surprise me. But if they hadn't come home for three days, I would have texted begrudgingly and then like, yeah, I still hate you. But like, I just want to make sure you're alive. Are you okay?

I get worried. I think it's a maternal instinct in women. I hope that you'd be concerned about somebody as a human, even if you're like, I'm not super happy with you as a, you know, a roommate right now, but I'm worried and I want to make sure you're okay. That's all. You know, it was cold out, things like that. So let me, let me, let me in the comments, guys, and let me know. Yeah, I think we'll be divided on that one. What's the obligation there? Well, Vanessa explained that around Thanksgiving, Megan had told her she was having issues with her roommate Hannah. And one of the issues was that Hannah often had a close friend

staying in the dorm. We're going to call this person Lane. So Megan didn't mind Elaine being around every now and then, but Lane was always there, and this left Megan feeling like a third wheel. Megan valued her space. She liked being able to relax in her room alone, you know, watching shows and movies, and she was frustrated that she couldn't when someone who wasn't supposed to be there was taking up that space. Now, I completely agree with this.

This is always an issue, I think, with roommates at college when they have people or friends over or boyfriends. Yep. And then you're like, okay, like every time I come in, you guys are using the TV and you're sitting here and you never leave this dorm room and this is not your personal apartment. It's a shared space. Like, have a little consideration. While you're sleeping, they're having sex right next to you. Yeah. Or just like being loud at night when you're trying to sleep. That's what I'm saying. Be allowed. Yeah, being loud that way, being allowed different ways. They're cooking at three

o'clock in the morning and you smell macaroni and cheese and you're hungry. College is great, but man, it's rough. I don't like it. I didn't like living with people. I do like my own space and I like things to be the way I want. Like you can't control that out in the real world, but at least you hope when you go back to your, like, safe space at night, the place where you lay your head and sleep, that you can control variables there. And when you can't, it's very frustrating. And there were other problems, too. Vanessa said Hannah's behavior was sometimes passive-aggressive.

Megan had a whiteboard outside the dorm room, and Vanessa had bought her a 32-color marker set. And at first, Megan and Hannah would write notes back and forth on this whiteboard. But soon Megan's notes started disappearing, they would be erased or replaced with. as Vanessa puts it, quote, snarky, crappy comments, end quote. And Megan noticed it only happened to her notes, never to Hannah's, and she suspected it was being done to undermine her, kind of like bully her. Vanessa said Hannah also tried to sabotage Megan's friendships guilt-tripping her if she spent time with new people.

Now, I do want to note that while many of these interactions were negative, the relationship between Megan and Hannah wasn't always like that. Sometimes they fought, but other times they got along great. And I will say this is very common, especially because I lived in a suite with three other girls. So there was four of us. And there would often be like, oh, now the three of us are mad at this one girl. And now the three of us are mad at a different girl. And now they are mad at me this week.

And it's very, you know, you're just leaving high school. You still haven't kind of shed that mentality completely. And it's pretty common. The whiteboard thing I know is very common to kind of like send messages to people that you're unhappy with or you don't like when they have a whiteboard on their door. But it sounded like Megan and Hannah started off good, you know, and then maybe other people came in. Other external variables happened, and it kind of got strained. But after speaking with Hannah about Megan not coming back to the dorm for three days, Vanessa contacted CU Boulder police to report Megan missing. And instead of taking her concerns seriously, officers told her Megan was probably couch surfing.

They said they'd seen it many times and that she would eventually show up. But her family rejected that explanation. They knew Megan's routines, and they knew she wouldn't just disappear. And if she was going to surf on anyone's couch, it would have been her sister Lindsay's who lived close by, but she wasn't there. Despite all of this, Vanessa said, CU Boulder didn't care. So as far as the college, CU Boulder itself, what kind of responsibility do they have when one of their students is MIA for three days, which I would assume means she wasn't going to classes. nobody had talked to her. Yeah.

What kind of responsibility does this college have when this happens? A responsibility to find her. Yeah. So what they did, what the college did, you would say is probably not. No. Not even not good, but not, you know, to their protocol of what they would usually do. I mean, I don't know what their protocols are. I would assume it's find the person, right?

Make calls. Call home. Call friends. Find acquaintances on campus. Check in with classroom professors. Do your research, right? Just the basics here. We're not talking about solving a cold case. I know most campus police officers are not, they're not Sherlock Holmes. But they can do the basic essentials. And if they're incapable of doing that, call in law enforcement. So yeah, find the person. Identify where they are. They can do the stuff that Vanessa can do. Like check with the teachers and see if Megan's been in class. They can, you know, check security cameras, things like that. Make an announcement, put some flyers up, talk to her friends, you know, and other residents in the area, the RAs on the floor of each floor.

And as you said, and as I said, professors, see if she's been to any classes. If she hasn't been to classes in three days and nobody can see her on campus, kind of obvious that something's not right, especially if you call home and they say, no, she's not at home. Well, where is she? Well, Vanessa called them. And they're like, yeah, she's couch surfing, you know, like, she'll be back. Right. Yeah, no, they screwed up. They screwed up. They should have. So right off the bat, we have, you know, a perceived figure of authority. Yeah. Not doing what they should do in this case. That's right. And we're going to come back to that.

Vanessa and her brother drove from Denver to Boulder to file a missing person's report while Joe drove separately. Lindsay, who lived near the campus, went straight to Megan's dorm where Hannah once again confirmed she had not seen Megan since Sunday. When Vanessa arrived, she found Hannah's friend, Lane, sitting on Megan's bed. It was shocking to see someone just using Megan's stuff as if she hadn't been missing four days. And I got to be honest, this would piss me off. Yeah, me too. Because this was probably what Lane was doing the whole time. Oh, yeah.

Right? Megan would walk in and this girl would be chilling on her bed and that would send me. Okay? Because I don't like people in my bed. Yeah, just overstepping boundaries. Even my own kids, they try to get in my bed. I'm like, remove your clothing, put different clothing on, take those socks off, put different socks on if you want. Take a shower, honestly, before you get in the bed because this bed is my

sanctuary and it needs to be clean and refreshed at all times. And I can't have just like college students who haven't showered in a week sitting on my bed. It would drive me crazy. So, so Joe said that at one point, while the family was gathered in Megan's room trying to figure out their next steps, Hannah popped her head in with a big smile on her face, grabbed something from her bed, thanked them, and left with, as he described it, quote, no recognition that were obviously in a crisis." He said it made his blood run cold, and Vanessa got the impression that Hannah wasn't troubled by Megan's absence at all.

To her, it felt like Megan being gone was convenient because it meant that her friend Elaine could stay and use Megan's things without question, and Megan wasn't there to get mad about it. So Megan's family had other things to worry about at that point, though. They asked CU Boulder to review surveillance footage for any sign of Megan, and the college agreed. But for four hours, they searched all. only for a girl with blue hair because that was the color listed on Megan's student

ID. As it turns out, no one had asked for an updated photo. It wasn't until that evening when campus police requested a current picture for a Bolo that Vanessa gave them a recent photo of Megan with red hair because Megan liked to dye her hair at different colors all the time. And since coming to college, she dyed it red from blue. Only then did the campus realize why she hadn't appeared in the footage. They'd been looking for the wrong person.

The Bola was released, but despite Megan's families' pleas, no physical searches were conducted for Megan that evening. And at this point, it's already been days. Days. So on Thursday, February 13th, Megan's family spent the day putting up flyers around Boulder. And as the hours passed with no sign of Megan, CU Boulder Police came to the realization that, hey, maybe Megan wasn't just couch surfing with a friend. You don't say. Yeah, well, that's crazy. It's been like four or five days at this point. This is insane. February 13th, she hasn't been seen since the 9th. And this is a big deal for a multitude of reasons, but it's going to come back up later when we find out what happened. You kind of gave a little bit of a way in the teaser, but this amount of time,

this duration literally could have been the difference between life and death, depending on what happened to Megan. So that's why it pisses me off so much, because this isn't always the case, but here, the timing really does make you wonder if she had been reported missing immediately by like, I don't know, Hannah. By Hannah, then to campus police, then to whoever, right? So it would have been escalated where it should have been. Maybe we find Megan and she's still alive. That's what I think about that bothers me.

Of course, of course. It's just in general, in general. As a parent, to think like, hey, I haven't talked to my daughter since, you know, February 8th or February 9th. And then it's been days since I've talked to her. And then I talked to her roommate's like, yep, February 9th, that's right. I haven't seen her since then. And you're like, wow, for days, while I was going about my life thinking everything was fine, living normally, my child could have been scared in pain. Needing help.

Needing help and not getting it because everyone's just like going about their business, not Megan's parents because they're not there. But like, yes, I will call out Megan's roommate for this. Yeah. This should have been reported. It should have been. She should have at least texted her. and said, just want to make sure you're okay. And when she didn't hear from her, go to campus police.

And then if campus police was like, oh, sorry, Hannah, your roommate's probably couch surfing, then that's completely and wholly on them. But at least let Megan's parents know, I would have done that. You would want someone to do that for your child. And one day Hannah's going to be a parent. And she's going to realize that what she did was kind of shitty. No offense. Hannah, sorry, not sorry.

I'm sure Hannah, I mean, I don't know Hannah, but I'm sure there's part of her that obviously has some regret. She has to live with some of this, you know, knowing. But, yeah, when you think about Colorado, the elements, the amount of time that passed, the timing was huge in this case, potentially. There's nothing obvious about how Megan died. You know, part of that could have been the elements and being out there and that exposure for that duration could have been a contributing factor here.

So when you think about that and you think about the possibility that she was out there and she was alive for maybe a day or two, that's tough. Yes. So CU Boulder finally launched a real investigation and the FBI were called in, which blows my mind once again, going from completely writing it off to bringing the FBI in. It's like, you know, that's great. That's the proper response. Well, once law enforcement learned about it, they took the proper action in that sense. Yeah. So investigators started using every tool available, security cameras, cell phone records, dorm hall key card access logs, and witness statements. And they used all this stuff to piece together, Megan's movements on the night of February 9th, when temperatures had dropped down to 17 degrees Fahrenheit. They learned that on the evening of the 9th, Megan and her boyfriend, who were going to call Kyle, they were in her dorm room while her roommate was at work.

Hannah, the roommate, was supposed to be working from 7.30 to 11.30 p.m., but at around 9, Hannah left work on her break and went back to the dorm. Megan and Hannah then argued because Kyle was there, which is like the audacity on Hannah's part. You got laying there all the time just lounging on people's beds and Megan can't have her own boy from there. That's just ridiculous. So they had an argument not to bring guys into the room. And Hannah said Megan had betrayed her boundaries.

The argument didn't last long and Hannah went back to work. Kyle told Megan he didn't want to be a part of the drama and suggested they take a break, like from the relationship, which also I think is an extreme reaction. But Kyle left the dorm at 9.17 p.m. And according to his mom, he was home. within 15 minutes. Megan left at 9.36 p.m. and was seen walking alone on campus. She was wearing white platform tennis shoes, which were three inches tall, red yoga pants, a black short, sleeved t-shirt, and a light denim-style jacket. She also, of course, had her signature purse with her. Yeah, and for those of you who are not on YouTube, the photo that we have on the screen right

now is from the dorm room surveillance footage, and it's exactly what Stephanie just described. To me, the big takeaway, when we get into where Megan was eventually found, if her intention was to go for a walk and it was to go out to this location where she would be found, yes. With the current conditions outside, this would not be what you would wear. She'd wear a heavier coat at the very least. It was freezing outside. mention maybe a winter hat, gloves, things like that. I agree. It was cold outside. And also, I've never walked in sneakers like the ones that she's

wearing, but I would think they'd be more comfortable footwear you could wear, especially if you're making that long of a walk. We're going to get to that point. We'll come back to this photo. But for anybody who can't see this image, this denim style overcoat or whatever it is, it does not look thick. It does not look like it'd be very warm. And that's a problem considering what we're going to talk about later where Megan is eventually found. So we're going to take a quick break. We only have one break this video. So this is our first and last break.

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com slash crime weekly and use code crime weekly that's hungry root dot com slash crime weekly code crime weekly to get 40% off your first box plus a free item of your choice for life one more time that's hungry root dot com slash crime weekly code crime weekly Okay, we're back. And by the way, I wanted to say this before we took a break, but then I was just, like, ran to the break. I have walked in shoes like this before, these sort of white platform. They call them like, yeah, they call them like sneakers, but they have a platform on them. And spice goes sneakers I call it.

Yeah, they're not comfortable. They're not walking shoes, okay? The distance between where Megan was at the CU Boulder campus and where. where she ended up, that would still have been far to walk in just regular sneakers and the kind of outfit that she was wearing. But in those shoes. So what Derek and I are trying to say is there's absolutely no doubt in our minds that when she left that dorm, she may have been like, hey, I'm going to take quick rock around campus, blow off some steam. But there's no way she was like, I'm going to have it take a really far hike tonight. No. In the middle of the night

when it's freezing out. I'm going to do that. No. I think there was one of two possibilities. And we're going to probably have a map up here in a little bit. But she was either walking to a convenience store or her sister's house, which wasn't too, too far. But definitely not where she was eventually found. So I don't know. I have some suspicions on how she got out there. But I don't think these are the clothes she would have worn to go that route, to go as far as she did. I'll also say this.

The ruling on this case is that Megan committed suicide. And I say that now because to think that this was the mindset. at this moment where she's going to dress in these clothes, bring her mom's purse, she's going to walk an hour in this type of outerwear. It just doesn't, it doesn't add up. There's so many other things that could have been done here if you were considering taking your own life. This doesn't appear to be a type of person based on what they were wearing and where they

were going that had the intention on killing themselves within the next hour or so. Yes, and we don't know this for sure. And this is once again, I will clarify with Megan's mother, but I would do this sometimes if like I'm mad at my roommate. Yeah, go back in steam. Go walk outside, especially if it's cold, you know, but I'm staying on the campus. I'm just going to kind of walk around the paths.

But what I would always have on me, and what I believe somebody like Megan would have on her as well, headphones, earbuds, something, right? She loved music, especially if she was considering taking such a long walk, you'd have the ability to play music. And what do we do with that, Stephanie? What do we do if we're going to wear earbuds? Well, we have to keep one out.

There we go. That's my girl. Yeah. I mean, I don't always follow that rule, but I'm also not always walking out in public. But if you're out walking campus, definitely. Yeah. Oh, walking the campus. If you leave the campus, it's dark, it's cold. Like, come on. I think she would have had those things with her. And as far as we know, based on what she would be found with, she didn't. Megan loved music. She loved listening to music. You don't take a long walk like that with nothing to listen to, especially kids these days. I'm sorry, but they don't have.

have the attention span to do that anymore. I agree with your overall assessment. She had just had a fight with her boyfriend. I think she was going to blow off steam. Maybe you walked the campus. She had to fight with her boyfriend and her roommate. And her roommate. Bad night.

I'm getting out of here. Maybe she's walking to the convenience store. Maybe she's going to her sisters. She ain't walking out to the middle of nowhere. So investigators found security footage of Megan at 9.52 p.m. She was walking north of her dorm near the Champions Center. Megan hadn't told anyone where she was going or why she left. Vanessa believes she walked out because she didn't want to be there when Hannah came home.

Both Vanessa and Joe believed she was likely headed somewhere familiar. North toward Arapo Avenue, either to Lindsay's apartment or to the Circle K at 17th and Arapo, just two blocks from Lindsay's. Joe called Megan a Diet Coke addict. He explained that since Hannah worked at the student market, Megan wouldn't have gone there for one. Because remember, Hannah was working and then she came back. She was supposed to work to 1130. she came back at nine on her break for some reason and started laying into to Megan and

her boyfriend for being there and then she went back to work. So Megan's not going to go to the student market because now you're going to see the same person that just, you know, pissed you off. Makes sense to me. You don't want to be there. Sister lives right down the road. Grab a drink. Head over to her place.

Maybe spend the night. Yeah, maybe spend the night. Just get out of there. Instead, you know, Joe believes that Megan would have walked across. campus to the Circle K, which would have taken her past the champion center on her way to Arapaho. And wherever she was headed, it was clear she didn't plan to be gone long. She wasn't dressed for the cold. Investigators didn't find any other footage of Megan on campus, so they checked with businesses in the area and homes along the route that she was likely taking,

but no additional footage was found. They also tracked Hannah's movements, and records showed she clocked out from work at 1129 p.m. and returned to the dorm at 1137. They're going to get that from the key card swipe data. They probably have also some same cameras who picked up Megan picking up her coming and going. So Hannah texted her friend when she got back to the dorm. She texted her friend Lane saying she'd had an issue with Megan and asked Lane to come over. Lane ended up sleeping in Megan's bed until Wednesday when Megan's family arrived to report her missing. I'm getting mad. I'm getting mad. You got in a fight with your roommate. She left.

And then you're like, yeah, Lane, come over, sleep in her bed? Nope. Ooh. So when CU Boulder police interviewed Hannah, she said that after the argument on Sunday night, she returned to work until her shift ended. And there's no evidence to say that that's not true or that it's not what she did. So Hannah told police that she and Megan spoke briefly once she was back at work. And she let them view her phone, which showed that Megan tried calling Hannah at 9.28 p.m.

but the call was unanswered. At 929, Megan sent a message that said, quote, I'm so sorry, you won't have to worry about it happening again, end quote. Hannah replied, quote, it's honestly not okay, but it's whatever. I want him gone when I get out of work. End quote. Hannah's a bitch. Okay. This is another thing, too, though.

Hannah's a bitch. I'm sorry. You focus on Hannah. What I'm focusing on, the fact that Megan even sent that message. I'm sorry. It won't happen again. Like, I'm respecting your wishes as your roommate, which you have never done. for me. It won't happen again. The fact that she's addressing it, trying to make amends,

not someone who's suicidal, not someone who's going to take their own life. Yeah, not someone who's like going to fight with Hannah about this. Someone who's like, I have to live with this person for the rest of the semester. I want things to be like smoothed over. AKA planning on being around. Yeah. And Hannah's over here throwing her power around. Like, I just, we can talk about the dynamics of the relationship between her and Hannah, but to me, that text message is critical in the sense it sounds like someone who plans on being there in the future. Yes, I agree. I completely agree.

So, yeah, Hannah replied back in her bitchy way, like, it's not okay. I want him out of there when I get out of work, and I'm going to have Lane come over and sleep in your bed. But then Megan answered back to this, quote, it's over, end quote. Now, Hannah thought Megan meant that Kyle had broken up with her. Later she asked Kyle what happened and he confirmed they had broken up. So Hannah further told investigators that when she got back to the dorm, Megan wasn't there.

She assumed Megan had gone to stay with her sister to give Hannah space because Hannah still thinks she's in the right for some reason. But she didn't hear for Megan again. So on the 12th, she tried texting to see if she was okay, but her texts were undeliverable. You didn't try texting her until the 12th, Hannah. Don't like Hannah. All right. So before the interview was over, Hannah was asked many personal questions about Megan. and Hannah revealed that Megan was not suicidal.

She hated the outdoors and the cold and that she didn't like to walk places. Investigators also spoke to Hannah's boss and confirmed that she'd been at work on the night of the 9th. However, they also mentioned that it wasn't typical for students to leave the workplace while on their 15-minute break. So that is interesting to me. Like, why did Hannah that day come back to the dorm? Like, did she get the heads up that Jake was there? Yeah, I think that's what I think it was. What a pitch?

I think she wanted to walk in on it. She wanted to make a big scene and have some high and mighty attitude. By the way, I want to also mention not only was Megan not a fan of the outdoors or the cold, she was also afraid of the dark. Yes, that's what her parents said. Yep. So investigators also spoke to Megan's boyfriend, Kyle, who was completely cooperative. He shared the same story as Hannah and the investigators didn't find him suspicious. He continued cooperating and even helped search for Megan.

Hannah, on the other hand, did not help with the search. and Lane avoided speaking with investigators for nearly two months. Their statements weren't collected until much later, and we won't be talking about them again until the next episode. So there were still questions about Megan's movements on the night of February 9th. The FBI used their stingray technology to track Megan's phone activity to help figure out where she'd been. They learned that at around 10.45 p.m., Megan's phone pinged near Ebyn G. Fine Park,

which sits at the mouth of Boulder Canyon Drive. that spot would be about a 52-minute walk from Megan's dorm. So this pinged at 1045. What time did she leave? 9.30. So we talked about this during the live podcast, and I said right out that is it possible? She could have. She had time to walk there.

She could make that walk. Yes, it is possible. But we have to remember what you're saying. Her phone pinged at that location. It doesn't mean that's when she arrived at that location. That means it bounced off one of the cells. towers in that area. She could have been at that location at this park for 20, 30 minutes, for all we know. So if that were the case, hypothetically, if that ping came in 25, 30 minutes

earlier, then it would be clear cut that there was some means of transportation that brought her out there. We know that she left without a car. So then the question becomes who was driving. So that's the problem with this 1045 ping. It gives the impression that she made the walk or that it was possible she made the walk. I'm not so sure about that. Which it is possible. It is possible. It's possible with the time

that she made the walk. It is. With a little bit of time to spare, actually. But check this out because Megan's phone connected one more time. It pinged one more time at 1155 p.m. Near the 40 mile marker of Boulder Canyon Drive, which is deeper into the canyon. So I say that to show you,

her phone pinged at 1045 and did not ping again until over an hour later. So she could have technically... That's right. So either she sat at the park for a while or she had been on the move. Or she was on the move or that's just when her phone happened to pang. And she could have once again been at the mouth of Boulder Canyon at one point and then deeper into the canyon shortly after that. But it's just when her phone pinged that we see that she's there. Yeah, you could be looking at a scenario where her phone pinged as she was walking by or through Ebbingi or she was actually in the park.

And if she was in the park, was she alone? Was she with someone? How did she get out there? How long had she been there? These are the questions that we don't currently have the answers to. And if we did, we may not be in the position we're in right now. But a lot of walking, when you consider how cold it was that night, the clothing she was wearing, the footwear she was wearing. She's afraid of the dark.

She doesn't like walking places. Walking alone. And by the way, the 40 mile marker, the direction she was going, there's nothing out there. There's no destination at the end of this where you'd be like, oh, she was walking to this location. That's possibly where she was trying to end up. there's nothing out that way where she could have been walking to. This is not some place that someone would go to at night. Like maybe during the day, if you want to take in the, you know, the, the canyon, I guess.

Yeah. And this wasn't a place, a spot she frequented. No. She wasn't like known to go out to this area. It wasn't like a, you know, a security blanket for her. No. Yeah. It didn't have special meaning to her that she would go there when she stressed.

It's dark. It's cold. And now it's almost midnight. That's banana. She's been out for two and a half hours in the dark and the cold, which is not something that Megan would do. I know you mentioned it earlier, for anybody who doesn't remember, 17 degrees outside. Yeah, freezing. 17 degrees outside.

That's freezing. Yeah. So also that 40-mile marker location that her phone pinged at at 1155, that's roughly three miles from her dorm, about an hour and 15 minutes on foot. For those not familiar with the area, CU Boulder's campus is set again. the western edge of town. Just north of campus is Arapaho Avenue, and further north is Boulder Canyon Drive. And that's a road that turns into a highway as it winds into the canyon alongside Boulder Creek. There's a bike path that runs behind it, but it's not the kind of place you'd expect someone to walk at night.

No. It's a highway with limited lighting, and Boulder Canyon is known for having a large homeless population and also a reputation for heavy drug use. So like if you're there at night, it's either because that's where you live or you're up to no good kind of thing. And neither of those things, you know, both of those things Megan would have known. Being a student at the campus nearby, three miles away, having, you know, lived in the area for, I mean, this was her second semester now, she would have known these things. She would have known the dangers. Students are often cautioned to stay away from the area for these reasons. The only other thing I want to point out is that her phone pinged at these times at these locations, that doesn't mean she was in possession of said phone.

Correct. That's just another thing to think about as you're adding all these different wrinkles in here. These are all answers that we don't have. So don't make the assumption that that's her walking with her phone at that time. It could be, but it could also be somebody else. Well, Megan's family's adamant. She never would have gone to the canyon willingly. She wasn't dressed for the cold. She wasn't dressed for a long walk. But even more importantly, Megan was afraid of the dark. Vanessa explained that even as a teenager, Megan would sometimes crawl onto the floor next to her bed after watching a scary movie because she didn't want to be alone in her room. On top of all of that, Megan hated hiking and spending time outdoors. She's a creative girl. She likes music. She likes movies. She likes dyeing her hair, arts and crafts projects, things like that photography. But she's not like an outdoorsy kind of girl. And I can relate. Neither.

am I. On the last family hike that Megan and her family went on, she threw up in the back of the car, and Lindsay remembered a rafting trip where Megan sat in front of the boat, seething because she didn't want to be there. So after investigators learned that Megan's phone had last pinged near the 40-mile marker on the night of February 9th, the Boulder County Sheriff's Office was called in. Agencies from across the county, including park rangers, brought in drones, search dogs, and a dive team to comb the area, but the searchers came up empty. Then on February 13th, Max, a volunteer with Boulder Emergency Squad and a search partner were assigned to research the 40-mile marker area. At one point, Max noticed a drainage culvert that runs beneath Boulder Canyon Drive.

It is big enough where you could stoop down and pass all the way through it, emerging on the other side by the rocks and creek. A homeless encampment was inside the culverts, and there was another encampment nearby along the creek. So Max climbed down over large rocks and boulders to look inside, using a scope to see further in. About eight feet in, he found an empty Adderall bottle. He examined it and saw a man's name on the label. Believing it to be the belongings of someone homeless, he put it back. While Max searched, his partner was positioned across the creek, watching him for several minutes.

Neither of them saw Megan, and after continuing their search without finding anything else, they left the area. On February 15th, more than 130 volunteers, including Joe and Vanessa, gathered in Boulder Canyon at 11 a.m. to begin yet another search. But then at 1230 p.m., a road closure was reported near mile marker 40 with rescue trucks on the scene. At first, volunteers thought it was due to the weather as it was starting to snow. Then they began to hope it meant one of the search teams had found something. But when Joe asked the deputy at the roadblock for information, he was told that details could not be shared. By 2.30 p.m., the snow was so heavy that the decision was made to call off the volunteer search. An hour later at 3.30 p.m., confirmation came back that a body had been found

at the 40-mile marker. It was 18-year-old Megan Trussell. Two park rangers had located her just before the volunteer searchers met up. The rangers were at the 40-mile marker when they looked down the steep slope that dropped towards the creek. From there, they saw Megan lying on snow-covered boulders and rocks. She was within 10 yards of the culvert that runs under Boulder Canyon Drive. The same one that Max and his partner had searched just two days earlier, the one where they found the Adderall bottle with a man's name on it. There was no flat ground where her body was lying, and the only way to reach her was to basically repel down the slope, which was filled with jagged rocks. Once they were down there, they saw Megan was completely covered in two to three inches of

snow. Police records describe Megan as lying on her back when she was found. Her left arm extended outward while her right arm was drawn up inside her jacket. She was wearing the same outfit she had last been seen in on campus, but her right shoe was gone, leaving only a torn black sock on that foot. Her jacket was buttoned, yet the left side was bunched over her torso, and her arm had slipped out of the ripped sleeve. On her right hand was a black, fingerless glove turned inside out. Now, Megan's parents don't believe this glove was Megan's. Her own gloves were located in her dorm room, and she never wore them that way. Close to her arm on the right side lay a broken stick,

and her left hand and fingernails were filled with dirt and debris. Underneath her body was a pair of gray pants, but they didn't match anything she'd been seen wearing in the surveillance footage, and no one has ever been able to explain where these pants came from. There's also been some confusion about whether or not her body was covered when she was first discovered. One deputy reported that it looked like a black tarp or a blanket lay over her, but the sheriff's office later disputed that, saying detectives and the coroner staff didn't recover any such item. For Megan's parents, it remains one of the many unanswered questions about

what really happened. They are also still trying to understand how her body hadn't been found sooner, with so many searches conducted in the exact location where she was eventually found. It's hard to believe no one spotted her bright red hair or red pants. Snowfall was either light or non-existent during those searches. Vanessa pointed out that drones capable of filtering for colors, including red, had been deployed, and nine dogs had searched the area, yet none of them detected Megan. From where she was, her body could even be seen from the road. Not to mention that just two days earlier, Max and his search partner had been there. Vanessa said they were just five feet away from where Megan was discovered. Yeah, and I actually want to play a video from detective

perspective real quick because what I did is I used Google Street View to actually walk that road where she was found because as I was reading it, I couldn't understand either how she could have been missed. And I was like maybe the way it's being described, they're just, they're making it seem like it would have been easier. But we're going to put the video in right here. So if you're on audio, it won't make a ton of sense, although I do describe everything. I would suggest fast forwarding over to this part in the video so you can see it for yourself. So we'll check out the video and then we'll talk about it. So ignore my kind of like skipping around a little bit. I'm trying to do my best. So I'm comparing the photos from Facebook to the area. So right there is one of the photos that you can see.

There's the fencing. And across from that would be the culvert that runs under the road right there. So again, you're looking at the culvert that would be over there and I'm trying to find points of reference that would confirm this is the exact location from the Facebook photos. So you have this little item here. It looks like some fencing. You go over to the Facebook photos. Here's the bike path on the opposite side and then you have there it is the fencing and then also that other object as well so that's our spot right that's definitely the location that we're looking for and you can see kind of the setup there and that slope as you can see in this photo not that extreme could definitely severely injure you but not terrible so i bring all that up because if you go back

into that video the bike path is on the opposite side so if she was by herself and she was just walking why would she choose the side that has maybe a foot of room with this really steep slope off of it and not just walk on the bike path side? It's huge. It's about six to eight feet wide. It's protected. It's prettier.

It makes no sense to be on that opposite side. And yet we have to believe that she's out there walking alone in the dark and cold and she just ends up in this particular spot. So yeah, so there's the video. You can kind of see it for yourself now, right? Like there's this other bike path side where you could stay safe and walk. So we would have to believe that she was either walking on the side, which was very steep, very narrow, or she at some point walked into that culvert under the road, which would lead out to the stream. And then you would ask the question, why the hell would you do that?

I mean, I'm not scared of the dark, but we've talked about it, the movie and stuff. And I ain't stepping into that culvert, especially if there are people inside the culvert sleeping or hanging out in there. As a young woman, I don't even, a young man, I'm not going anywhere. near that. No. But the fact that there would have been people at that location is going to be a big part of the story as we go on when we start thinking about how this case unfolded and who's involved because as it was mentioned by Stephanie, that culvert, which is kind of like

this concrete tube, was known to have people staying inside of it. Yeah, there was a homeless encampment inside and then also a little bit further away alongside the river. So two technically encampments that are right there. Right there. And her body from the photos and Shannon's going to be importing them throughout this episode, but it was right next to that culvert on the rocks right next to it. So would be very difficult to miss her. And I mean, we do. We have a lot of questions here. So many questions. You deployed search dogs. You deployed drones. You deployed search parties. And nobody saw this girl red, red pants laying there. The snow didn't start till the day they basically found her body.

Exactly. I mean, listen, my best guess, and I can't explain it, Stephanie, my best guest is that she was there most of the time. I don't know how they missed her. I really don't. What I was more focused on was where she was eventually found. Maybe during the searches, she was covered by something. And then somebody came and took that away. Possible. Maybe somebody put that like a tarp of some kind over her so she wouldn't be found. And then somebody else, one of the homeless people that was around grabbed it thinking like, hey, it's going to snow soon. So let me grab this tarp and like put it over me or whatever, my belongings. And that's when her body was found. And the homeless person was like, well, I'm not calling this in because I'm going to be suspected. So I'm just going to go about my

business, take my tarp with me and, and, you know, pretend I didn't see anything. I don't want to be involved. And that is so important. And the reason that it's so important is because in the photo, we'll have it up on the screen right now. You can kind of see a blue tarp in it. That is a big question that Joe and Vanessa have was, because it's still kind of the jury's out on it, was there a tarp over her or not? If there was a tarp over her,

obvious, right? Somebody else is involved with this because if she killed herself or it was an accident, what are the chances that she fell down this embankment and covered herself up with a tarp after being injured? Yeah, she was covered. I think I'll just sleep here tonight. Hey, come on.

If she was covered, there's intention there. There's an intention to make sure her body is not discovered. And I would really like to know from those researchers, if they did happen to miss her body, do they remember seeing a tarp or something similar in that nature where? You're talking about Max too, Max and his partner? Yes. You know, that maybe she camouflaged in a little bit where in hindsight they're like, you know, I wish I would have removed that. But these are the questions that I have.

I do think without having all the answers, it's highly likely that she had been there the entire time. I don't think that whatever happened to her happened, and then she was moved and left there. Yeah. Why would they move her to the place where the searches were happening? It's too much of a risk. So I think she was there the whole time. How they missed her? I don't know.

Well, Megan had been found in Boulder County. So the Boulder County's sheriff office took over the investigation. They did a cursory search of the area, which once again was being covered in heavy snow. Investigators noted numerous frozen items likely belonging to the homeless people. people who often stayed there. Inside the culvert pipe, they found between six and ten small blood drops, each about one-eighth to one-quarter of an inch in diameter. The spots appeared fresh. They were still a bright red color, but they were completely dry, so swabs were taken for testing. Nearby detectives collected the empty Adderall prescription bottle Max had previously found and a

backpack. Inside the backpack was clothing and a candle, but none of it belonged to Megan. The pill bottle, however, did. So when Max had first found it on February 13th, he'd mistakenly read the prescriber's name rather than Megan's. And this is frustrating to me. This is frustrating to me because you're looking for Megan Trussell. You have a prescription bottle in your hand that says Megan Trussell on it. Yep. And you just looked at the wrong name. Makes me question his research a little bit. I'm not going to lie. Yeah. I don't know about Max here. I'm kidding. He's probably be great. But, you know, that's a detail you probably don't want to miss. He was probably like nervous. He's like, hey, I'm in this culvert. Like, there's a known

homeless encamping in here. I'm not trying to, you know, hang out here too long, holding the prescription bottle of somebody who this could belong to. Anything could happen. I'm going to get out of here. Most likely that's what happened. So Vanessa explained that Megan had two Adderall bottles with her. She carried them everywhere because she didn't want to leave them in her dorm, which makes complete sense, right? Because I've been on Adderall for a while and I never leave them anywhere. Like, especially if there's people over. I got kids so they can get into it. And if you're living in a dorm, college students love Adderall, man. They love it. So you don't want to, you know, have somebody down half of your prescription and then you're screwed for the rest of the month. So Megan had confided that her roommate's mother, so Hannah's mom, who often came into the dorm, had a substance abuse disorder. And Megan didn't want to risk her medication being left accessible. So she would bring it with her if she left.

Vanessa shared that Megan had been prescribed Adderall extended release for four years. Extended release. Keep that in mind. It's important. And Megan's dosage eventually reached 25 milligrams, which is a normal dose, by the way. That's not super high, especially if you've gotten there over time. So after going off to college, Megan also asked for immediate release pills so she could take them later in the morning without it affecting her sleep. Her pediatrician who had treated her since birth agreed and additionally prescribed her a 20 milligram

tablet she could take if needed. That was her second prescription, so she's got an extended release and then an immediate release. So at this point, one of Megan's pill bottles had been located, but the other one hadn't. Neither had her right shoe, her purse, or her phone, but detectives waited days to tell the family this information. After Megan was recovered, her body was taken for autopsy. In the days that followed, the coroner's office gave Megan's parents, Joe and Vanessa, a preliminary update. They were told there were no signs of trauma, only a scratch on Megan's leg that looked like it could have been caused by a branch. But when Vanessa and Joe later received the final report, they realized that wasn't the case at all.

Megan hadn't suffered a single superficial mark. Her body showed injuries from head to toe. In fact, there were so many injuries that the list filled nearly an entire page in the autopsy report. It was shocking for Joe and Vanessa to read. And it was only the beginning of the painful discoveries they would have to endure. But what they learned next, along with what was in Megan's autopsy report, we'll have to wait for part two because there's still a lot to talk about. But I know because this case, the second that, you know, Derek had told me about it and when I met Joe and Vanessa, I've been really focused on it. And for a lot of reasons, mainly because what the official statement from law enforcement is doesn't make sense. But also, what's going on here?

What's going on with Boulder, the campus as a college itself? Why do they take so long to do anything to find Megan? What's going on with the autopsy and the coroner's office for them to tell Joe and Vanessa, like, yeah, she's got a scratch on her leg, but, you know, could have been from a branch. And then they get the autopsy report, and there's so many injuries on their daughter's body that it fills an entire page. Yeah. What is happening here? What is happening here?

And why does it seem like everybody around law enforcement included, as you'll see, wants to sort of look the other way and pretend that this isn't what it is, what it very clearly is? Why do they all want to do that? The coroner's office, the college, the police, the police, what's happening here? Why is it so important to make what happened to Megan look like an accident or her own fault? Instead of acknowledging and investigating what it clearly is here, which is neither of those things, in my opinion. I've done a good job of not spoiling anything this episode, so I'm not going to ruin it in the last couple minutes of the episode.

I will say to your second question there as far as why they would want this to go away, Vanessa had shed some light on that. There was some things that were going to talk about that made. give us a little bit of insight as to why they wouldn't want a murder at this time around the campus. Yes, she did, yep. As far as the report, I had said in the live podcast, this case reminds me a lot of Devin Schmidt from Seattle. And what I'll say is this, without giving too much away, yes, pathology is a science.

But the interpretation of the body and the injuries is subjective. and unfortunately you have certain doctors who will look at something and come to one conclusion and the doctor next of them could look at the same set of injuries and come to a different conclusion and the problem with that is depending on what they say law enforcement is handcuffed I've seen it personally where if a M.E. comes back and says that it's this or it's that you can't go after someone for a homicide if the pathologist says it's an accident or a suicide. You literally can't. You have to get that determination, that conclusion overturned first.

So that is a big hang up in this case. Yeah, but Derek, you can say like, oh, two people can look at an autopsy report or two people can conduct an autopsy and get different ideas of what happened. Fine. But for the coroner's office to tell Joe and Vanessa, there's no signs of trauma. That's not a misinterpretation of the autopsy. the report that's a straight out it's a lie that's a lie yeah and and that's something where and i like joan venez i would love to hear how it was put to them did they just downplay the other

injuries i don't know what happened there i agree with you did when we get into part two and we talk about the injuries they're extensive yes they're extensive i mean there's a broken tooth i think more than one yeah there's that there's there's there's a lot going on here so yeah i'm not go too much into it. Obviously, I concur with your assessment. I think this is just the ball was dropped left and right. And the ME stuff really pisses me off. I'm just on a macro level because I've dealt with it in numerous cases. And I found that in a lot of the cases I worked on breaking homicide, it all came back to the ME because they are judge and jury, basically. If they come to a certain conclusion, that's it. That's it. It's all you can do, which really sucks. If the town had things

going on maybe that they didn't, you know, necessarily want to be, you know, have to leave a black mark. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Then maybe there was somebody who spoke to the coroner's office beforehand. Like, hey, like, let's keep this, you know, in-house. I agree. It's definitely possible. I think about it with Idaho four. You know, that's the same thing. I thought the same thing. But I will say, I'm not even going there with that, even though that could be. be a possibility here. I've seen it in cases where there's nothing going on. It's not around a university. There's nothing as far as having a negative reputation. And still, you have these MEs who are past their prime and they look at a case and they completely botch it. And now everyone's

chasing their tails trying to figure out how they're going to solve this one. Devin Schmidt, for those of you who don't know, the original M.E. basically said that she killed herself or that she overdosed on cocaine. And spoiler alert, I end up proving that that wasn't what happened. She was actually assaulted. I believe she was murdered. And it went to trial. They arrested the guy and it went to trial.

And unfortunately, based on the judge, he beat the case. It is what it is. But at least Devin had her day in court, at least a chance to have her accuser held responsible. I'm still bitter about the whole thing. But the point being, an M.E. said that it was an overdose or suicide. And this gentleman, and I'm saying, saying that sarcastically, ended up getting up on the stand admitting to having something going on with her. He said it was rough sex. But it basically proved that the Emmy was wrong. And that

was just one case. How often does that happen? Thank on for Dr. Conti Diallois from a Hawaii who came in and got it right. And we got this thing to trial. But I think about all the cases where this determination is made. And a lot of the times they go with undetermined. It's ridiculous. It pisses me off. And if you're going to go with undetermined, no problem, allow your colleagues to come in and give a second opinion. But just like with police officers, we talked about it in the Christian Griggs case, they don't want anybody second guessing their work. They don't want someone coming in and showing that they did it wrong. So they hold, they, they hunker down, they lock in, and they don't want anybody double checking what they've done because deep down, there's an ego attached to it and they're

afraid that someone's going to come in and say, hey, you don't know what you're doing. I don't know definitively if that's what happened here, but based on what you just said and based on what we're going to talk about in the path, the autopsy report next episode, it seems like this person did not have their, their shit together. You mean the pathologist? Well, you know, looking it up, there's a lot of issues with this coroner's office. In fact, the coroner Emma Hall, who had served multiple terms, she was basically forced to resign in, in 2024 because of issues and in following an investigation about, you know, high turnover, leadership issues, negative office atmosphere. So it kind of looks like at this time when when Megan Trussell died, the Boulder County

coroner's office was sort of up in the air. It's like, oh, this one person's going to like fill in until the end of her term, but we don't know who that's going to be yet. And so it's a mess. So it was the Boulder County coroner Jeff Martin who took up for Emma. after she was forced to resign, and he kind of came in pretty much very shortly before Megan's death. So, I mean, honestly, to look at that and to say, hey, should we redo this? Should we look at it again? Should we get a second opinion? It's not crazy because you had one person acting as the coroner for, you know, a long time, like several years, almost.

I think it was 15 years that she'd been in there. And then you have somebody else. And this person clearly is not on top of their game because to say a small scratch on her leg and no signs of obvious trauma, that's absolutely insane. No, exactly. And that's a major issue in this case right now and why we are where we are now because this case is currently closed because of partially because of this determination that was made by the ME. Yeah, a very big part to do to this determination. Yeah. So we, we, that's number one thing that I would like to see redone, allow another pathologist to take a, to take a second look at the findings and see if they come to a similar conclusion.

Well, Megan's family said they did that. They had someone else come in. They had an independent, yeah, they had an independent pathologist. And the person was, you need the coroner's office to do it, though. Like, because the independent investigators, because the case is currently available to everybody. It's closed. But we need someone internally to come in. And so that way it's actually reviewed and also. respected, whatever decision comes out where they can say, okay, we've brought our person in and they also think that they got it wrong. That could cause them to change the ruling of her, of her death and could force the case to be reopened. It's really pissing me off to because I read the Boulder

County Sheriff's Office official like statement after this. And they're like, yeah, sadly, sadly it was a suicide. And then, you know, they encouraged anyone experiencing a mental health crisis to reach out for help. And it's like, I mean, once we talk about, guys, once we talk about how she was found her injuries, the way they claim. Conditions of certain items. Yeah, the way they claim she died is just going to be absolutely ridiculous. And it seems like they're doubling down on this when it, and nobody believes it. Nobody believes it. If you look on the Facebook page and you see this statement, everybody underneath is like, are you guys crazy? What are you talking about? Yeah, no, it's insane. Well, that's why right now, $11,000 reward for anybody.

with information leading to an arrest in Megan's case. If you know something, if you're from the Colorado area and you knew it back when this happened in February and you just didn't feel like this was the time to come forward, it's not too late. Actually, it's very early in this investigation. Yeah, this happened earlier this year, February of this year. Joe and Vanessa are out there fighting. You still have the chance to help them get the justice they deserve.

If you know something, even if it might seem small, that could be the missing piece that connects the entire puzzle. So come forward. if it leads to a person, they're arrested for it. Stephanie and I are putting up $10,000. They have a $1,000 reward already. So if you're not going to do it just for the right reason, there's also a financial incentive as well.

So come forward. We'll have more information. We're going to have other parts to this. Any final words from you, Stephanie? No, I'm excited to talk about this next week. Yes. And kind of... We're just scratching the surface.

Yeah, really get into it. I mean, if you remember, Boulder County was also John Bonnet, Ramsey. And they didn't do a great job with their investigation either. So it seems to be a pattern at this point. And we're going to address it all. And we can't wait to hear what you think about it. But let us know in the comments if you're watching on YouTube what you think about this so far. And until then, we'll see you next week. Absolutely. Until then, everyone stay safe out there. We'll see you soon. Bye. Thank you.