The mother of a University of Colorado student who was found dead in Boulder Canyon last month wrote Tuesday night that her daughter was discovered with only one shoe and her purse was found ripped, leading her to believe “there was a struggle.”
The body of Megan Trussell, 18, was found dead Feb. 15 in “hard-to-reach” terrain near the 40-mile marker of Boulder Canyon Drive, just west of the intersection with Canyon Park.
On Tuesday, her mother, Vanessa Diaz, wrote in a Facebook post that her daughter was found wearing only one 3-inch platform tennis shoe.
Diaz wrote that she and trusted friends searched the area where Trussell was found this weekend and the other shoe was not there.
The Boulder County Sheriff’s Office confirmed Tuesday that Trussell’s purse was found. An anonymous source confirmed with the Daily Camera on Tuesday that the purse was found at about 11 a.m. March 5 near U.S. 36, just southeast of Table Mesa Drive near Dry Creek Ditch Number 2, at least two miles from where her body was discovered.
Diaz wrote on Tuesday night that the side seam on the purse was ripped out and, having sewn the purse herself, she said she knew the seam was reinforced “very thoroughly.”
“Megan called her purse her ‘security blanket,’ and she would not have ditched it along with the prized possessions that she carried inside it. Someone ripped this purse from her,” Diaz wrote in the release.
“The damaged purse and the missing shoe lead me to believe there was a struggle, or, at the very least, another person with her when she died,” Diaz added.
The sheriff’s office did not confirm Tuesday whether foul play is suspected.
“Although the cause and manner of death has yet to be determined by the Boulder County Coroner’s Office, we still have no reason to believe that there is, or was, a threat to the community,” the sheriff’s office wrote in a news release.
Trussell’s final autopsy report has not yet been completed, according to the Boulder County Coroner’s Office.
Trussell was last seen leaving her campus dorm, Hallett Hall, at 9 p.m. Feb. 9, six days prior to the discovery of her body in Boulder Canyon.
She was wearing a blue or gray jacket, dark-colored yoga-style pants and white platform sneakers, according to Christine Mahoney, a spokeswoman for the CU Boulder Police Department. She also had a cobalt violet Samsung Galaxy phone, as well as the pink and blue star purse, Diaz said.
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