Dive teams come back empty-handed after search for new evidence in Trotter murder

Dive teams searched parts of Lake Conroe for six days, looking for two-decade-old evidence in the Melissa Trotter murder. Dive teams searched parts of Lake Conroe for six days, looking for two-decade-old evidence in the Melissa Trotter murder. Photo: Nicole Hensley Photo: Nicole Hensley Image 1 of / 5 Caption Close Dive teams come back empty-handed after search for new evidence in Trotter murder 1 / 5 Back to Gallery

They found beer cans, Christmas trees and dumbbells. They found coffee containers and yards upon yards of fishing line. Somewhere around day three of the search, they pulled up a seat cushion.

But they never found what they were looking for.

After six days of searching, dive teams in Montgomery County came back empty-handed after combing through part of Lake Conroe for 19-year-old evidence in the murder of Melissa Trotter.

A hand-drawn map recovered from a death row cell back in July pointed investigators to the new search spot, a short stretch of relatively shallow lake water under what locals know as the FM 1097 short bridge in Willis.

That map - along with other materials relating to the slaying recovered in Houston serial killer Anthony Shore's cell - threatened to muddy the case against Larry Swearingen, who has been on death row for the killing for nearly two decades.

"We're trying to be thorough and check off all the boxes," Montgomery County District Attorney Brett Ligon said after the search got underway Monday.

Led by Montgomery County Precinct 1 Constable Philip Cash's office at Ligon's request, the search focused on finding specific evidence belonging to the slain teen that was allegedly tossed off the bridge just after the killing. Ligon declined to specify what the evidence might be, citing a fear of copycats.

A combination of volunteer divers and constable deputies picked through the muck at the bottom of the sandy lake bed, poking along the bottom in nearly black water. The search area extended a little over 1,000 feet along the bridge and 70 feet out in either direction - the farthest investigators estimated a killer could have tossed the evidence in question.

In some spots, divers went as deep as 15 feet, but in other areas they walked through knee-deep water to hunt.

But - to no one's surprise - they failed to recover anything related to the case.

"We're getting pretty close to how long evidence could last underwater," Precinct 1 Lt. Timmy Cade said during day five of the search. Two decades of currents and storms could eat away at the materials, he said. But the evidence also could have been submerged beneath the sand and silt - if it was ever actually there to begin with.

"My belief in the guilt of Larry Swearingen has never wavered," Ligon said. "Those who question the delay, the additional search and the agreement to test the few remaining inconsequential items for DNA simply don't understand death penalty litigation."

After years of courtroom battles, Swearingen's case moved back into the spotlight earlier this year, not long after a judge approved a November execution.

The Willis man had already dodged four dates with death, but as a fifth drew near, investigators uncovered a supposed plot with Shore. The two men had allegedly schemed to have Shore confess to Swearingen's murder and plant evidence from the other crime in his own cell, a move that would have clouded matters in a case where the condemned killer has long professed his innocence.

The plot pushed a judge to move back Shore's October execution for the decades-old slayings of Maria del Carmen Estrada, Laurie Tremblay, Diana Rebollar and Dana Sanchez.

Days later, a court called off Swearingen's execution, in light of a paperwork snafu.

But instead of resetting the date, lawyers on both sides agreed to further DNA testing and dive teams took to the waters of Lake Conroe in a failed hunt for more evidence.