Megan Trussell’s Suicide After Roommate Fight Isn’t Believable, Family Says (Exclusive)

Megan Trussell was a couple of week into her freshman yr on the College of Colorado in Boulder, on the finish of August final yr, when she texted her dad. 

“I simply had my first movie class, and my task is to look at a film after which touch upon it,” wrote the 17-year-old, who had a inventive streak and a playful aspect. She was a bass participant who was good at mimicking a instructor’s Scottish accent; she loved writing film evaluations. (She’d revealed a scathing critique of Ben Stiller’s Reality Bites.)

She appeared, in Boulder, to be at residence. 

“COLLEGE RULES,” she texted her father, Joe Trussell, that August day.

Six months later, on Feb. 12, Joe was shocked not to have the ability to attain Megan. 

He texted her and her older sister asking in the event that they wished to satisfy for lunch that coming weekend. However Megan, who had turned 18, wasn’t responding — which is how the household found that nobody had seen her for 3 days.

Three days after that, on the morning of Feb. 15, two park rangers found Megan’s missing body simply outdoors town, previous the place the orderly grid of neighborhood streets and companies offers method to the mountainous terrain that includes a lot of the state.

Megan was frozen the place she was discovered, mendacity on an incline close to a drainage culvert and creek; about two inches of snow lined her physique. All that was seen was her face and her distinctive crimson hair.

She was nearly instantly pronounced lifeless. In late Could, authorities ruled that she’d killed herself “as the results of the poisonous results of amphetamine,” with hypothermia as a contributing issue.

However her mother and pa, Vanessa Diaz and Joe Trussell, proceed to dispute that conclusion and say they’ve been doing their very own investigative work whereas pushing authorities to dig deeper.

They really feel positive there may be extra to the story — extra to Megan’s life and to her loss of life. 

She wasn’t suicidal, they insist. It doesn’t make sense.

This account of the case relies on interviews with Megan’s household and pals in addition to statements from native authorities and a evaluation of obtainable studies, together with the post-mortem, that paint an advanced and at occasions contradictory portrait of a younger lady in her remaining days.

“Sheriff [Curtis] Johnson believes that his detectives and deputies performed a radical investigation into Megan’s loss of life based mostly on all accessible proof,” a spokesperson for the Boulder County Sheriff’s Workplace says.

Her dad and mom disagree. 

“I might be prepared to simply accept a suicide discovering should you had definitive proof that that is what occurred,” Joe, 54, says. “However there may be an excessive amount of proof.”

“The circumstances are very suspicious,” provides Diaz, 52. “She’s lacking a shoe that has by no means turned up.”

The final time Megan was seen

Everybody typically agrees on some issues.

Megan was final seen on safety cameras leaving her on-campus dorm round 9 p.m. native time on Feb. 9. She was carrying yoga pants, a sweater, jacket and tennis footwear and was carrying a spherical, blue purse with a big pink star. 

Diaz, a highschool principal in Denver, says Megan sewed the purse herself as a nod to a personality from the Scott Pilgrim franchise. Megan did that form of factor. She and her older sister additionally dyed their hair in coordination — one crimson, the opposite blue; or vice versa — as a reference to Sonic the Hedgehog.

Earlier than strolling out of her dorm that February night time, Megan had a combat along with her roommate and her new boyfriend after the roommate discovered them being intimate of their room, investigators later wrote of their studies. Megan and the boyfriend then “acquired into an argument about what occurred,” and he broke up along with her and blocked her on his cellphone, based on one of many case file studies.

(PEOPLE will not be figuring out both the boyfriend or roommate as neither has been accused of any wrongdoing.)

Quickly after, Megan left her dorm, wandered for a time round campus and was misplaced from public view. 

“It was uncommon for Megan to stroll anyplace, this kind of conduct was out of character for her,” a detective later wrote.

It seems nobody even knew she was gone.

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Within the hours and days after Feb. 9, Megan’s roommate assumed she was staying along with her older sister, who was additionally a scholar on the college (and whose dad and mom requested that she to not be named on this story).

It was on Feb. 12, when Megan’s dad couldn’t attain her, that her household reported her lacking. Searches ensued.

Three days later, on a below-freezing Saturday amid regular snowfall, volunteers who had been trying into studies of a homeless encampment within the space stumbled upon some belongings of Megan’s outdoors town: a backpack filled with clothes and, close by, a bottle for Adderall. 

The person who discovered the capsule bottle instructed investigators his “coronary heart dropped” as soon as he realized who it belonged to.

What the post-mortem discovered

The county coroner has launched two autopsies in Megan’s loss of life, in Could and July. The newest, an up to date report from the primary, included the outcomes of checks on her abdomen contents after a push by her dad and mom.

In each studies, the coroner’s workplace mentioned that the 18-year-old died by suicide “because of the poisonous results of amphetamine,” a key ingredient in Adderall that Megan’s dad and mom acknowledge she took. 

Officers discovered three empty bottles for the capsule in her dorm, along with the bottle close to her physique. Every may maintain 30 capsules.

Hypothermia was additionally a contributing issue.

Deputy Coroner Kolleen Hancock says Megan’s physique was discovered about 20 toes down a steep, rocky slope with blunt power accidents — however these wounds have been in step with a fall and didn’t contribute to her loss of life.

Dr. Priya Banerjee, an out of doors forensic pathologist unconnected with the case, reviewed the post-mortem information for PEOPLE and agreed that Megan died by suicide.

“She had a abdomen and throat filled with capsules,” Banerjee says. “That to me may be very intentional. Not often are you able to force-feed somebody that many capsules.”

Relating to the accidents, together with bruising, abrasions and at the very least one damaged tooth, Banerjee says that whereas drug toxicity is what killed Megan, she might need been confused or “deliberately fell off, tumbled off the cliff or jumped off.”

Publicity to the chilly was dangerous, too.

Megan’s household contends her uncommon method of loss of life — partway into the wilderness, at night time, alone and along with her garments, solely to be discovered injured with out her cellphone or purse — doesn’t point out suicide, nonetheless. They don’t settle for that.

‘Life was going properly,’ however ‘points’ lurked

On Feb. 18, three days after Megan was positioned, authorities spoke with Megan’s older sister about her way of thinking earlier than her loss of life.

“[Her sister] mentioned that Megan’s life was going properly,” an investigator wrote in a report. “Megan actually preferred faculty, she was courting somebody she actually preferred, the one factor she did not like was her roommate.”

Megan had additionally been trying ahead to a cousin’s party and her sister believed that “regardless of how down Megan was, she didn’t suppose that she would kill herself.”

Authorities discovered that Megan had had no historical past of suicidal conduct and didn’t go away any form of word in her room earlier than she died, based on the case information reviewed by PEOPLE. 

Megan’s sister maintained that she didn’t abuse her Adderall.

However her sister mentioned she did battle, at the very least a bit — like with faculty and her dad and mom’ divorce two years earlier.

“Their dad and mom have been actually into grades, and it gave the impression of this brought on Megan some points,” her sister instructed investigators, they wrote.

Her sister additionally mentioned, based on the case file studies, that it was “very unusual” for her to comprehend that Megan didn’t come to her after the incident on Feb. 9 along with her roommate and boyfriend. The 2 had a bond; Megan spent a while at her sister’s condominium as their mother and pa have been splitting up again in Denver.

Nonetheless, her sister mentioned, they didn’t speak about all the pieces.

“I requested … if she knew whether or not Megan had ever handled any form of heartache. [She] mentioned that her Spotify playlist would counsel that,” Megan’s sister instructed a detective, based on the studies.

When “requested if she was conscious of whether or not Megan was ever depressed or was it something particular, or what was it,” her sister mentioned she “thought it was principally only a teenage woman factor.” 

She acknowledged their dad and mom’ divorce had been “traumatic” for Megan, as one detective put it.

Talking with PEOPLE, Joe, Megan’s father, says that the divorce was distressing however she “by no means as soon as turned on herself.” 

“She dealt with it extraordinarily properly contemplating the circumstances,” he says. “She was a powerful child.”

Wanting extra from investigators

Virtually because the begin, Megan’s dad and mom have criticized the regulation enforcement response. 

Talking to PEOPLE in June after Megan’s loss of life was dominated a suicide, her mother known as out the sheriff’s workplace for having a “callous perspective and apparent bias because the begin.” 

The case file exhibits in addition they shared their issues instantly with a detective — that they felt a concentrate on suicide would blind authorities to different proof. 

Authorities reassured Megan’s mother and pa that they have been investigating different prospects.

Some odd developments fueled the dad and mom’ suspicion about what actually occurred. Megan’s lacking cellphone, which officers say pinged twice late on Feb. 9 close to the place her physique was in the end discovered, was solely positioned the next month. It was traced to a resale kiosk at a Boulder grocery retailer on March 2. 

Authorities went on to accuse Elliot Bearfore, a homeless man, of theft and false declaration to a pawnbroker after he allegedly tried to promote the cellphone.

In response to regulation enforcement, Bearfore mentioned he’d gotten the cellphone from one other homeless man, named Travis, who mentioned he initially discovered the cellphone and purse outdoors town however didn’t report them.

Travis mentioned he later left the purse on a motorcycle path, the place a passerby discovered it and called it in in March. The purse additionally had an empty capsule bottle inside. (Megan’s shoe, nonetheless, has by no means been positioned.)

Neither homeless man was accused in reference to Megan’s loss of life; they might not be reached for remark. Bearfore is predicted again in courtroom in October.

Megan’s dad and mom vehemently deny that she would take her personal life. As an alternative, they imagine she was attacked after she left residence the night time of Feb. 9 to get a Eating regimen Coke — her favourite drink.

“The one place she may purchase a Eating regimen Coke on campus was the place her roommate labored, so she could not go there [after they fought],” Diaz says. “I believe she was going to Circle Ok or one other comfort retailer …. After which I believe someplace alongside that path, any individual grabbed her.”

Diaz thinks somebody took Megan’s purse, and she or he was pulled as she fought again — giving her the blunt power accidents described in each autopsies. That will make the capsules present in Megan’s system a cover-up by the assailant, and she or he would have been pressured to take them.

Joe, who owns a business driver faculty, claims authorities by no means “wavered” from the assumption Megan died by suicide. His ex-wife agrees. 

“They did nothing to rule something out,” she says. “Actually, it was affirmation bias. They solely went with what aligned with what their principle was.”

Joe says he was pissed off when he met with a detective on the case and was allegedly instructed the detective was engaged on a variety of different instances and was solely going to contact the household if there have been “huge” updates.

A freshman was “discovered lifeless in a canyon. I do not understand how you do not prioritize that,” Joe says.

The official conclusions about Megan’s loss of life appear to be “a particularly elaborate means for any individual who’s by no means had a historical past to commit suicide,” Joe says. 

She even hated mountaineering.

“Megan was a fairly well-adjusted individual,” he says. “She was a fairly well-put-together lady, and nothing in her previous conduct would level to that. I additionally discover it extraordinarily offensive, although it is inside their rights, for the Boulder sheriff of their press launch to say that she had amphetamine in her physique when it was an Adderall prescription. As a result of the general public notion then turns into, ‘Oh, that is only a meth-head who killed herself.’ ”

Sheriff Johnson’s workplace declined to make him accessible for an interview for this story and a spokesperson mentioned in an announcement that “it’s commonplace follow for our company to restrict public remark in instances involving suicide with a view to keep a way of dignity for these affected and to deal with these conditions with the seriousness they deserve.”

“All accessible leads have been adopted till each our workplace and the Coroner’s Workplace reached our remaining conclusions,” the spokesperson mentioned.

A future lower brief

Megan’s dad and mom have retained a non-public investigator, who’s within the early phases of their very own work, and are providing $6,000 for data that results in an arrest. 

They’ve launched an outreach program with the native homeless neighborhood within the hopes that it might probably result in doable new leads; a Change.org petition has been created to induce that Megan’s case be reopened.

“The objective is, No. 1, to clear Megan of getting her identify related to suicide, as a result of I do not suppose it is true,” her dad says. “No. 2, to catch whoever is accountable. As a result of what’s misplaced in all that is that any individual performed a component on this, they usually’re nonetheless on the market and probably nonetheless on the market amongst 40,000 faculty college students. And no one appears to be that. And that is a scary factor.”

Joe says the second post-mortem, with testing on Megan’s abdomen, left him with extra questions than solutions. 

“We do not know what else was within the abdomen contents,” he says. “They solely examined for toxicology. And, we do not know the place this further capsule materials got here from. Megan didn’t have any Adderall past her regular prescription in her possession.”

Months after Megan was discovered, sisters Brie and Madison Brocato nonetheless hope for closure within the loss of life of their childhood pal.

They bear in mind how she used to go snowboarding with them for New Yr’s. They bear in mind her humorousness.

“She was at all times simply tremendous vibrant. … she was very quick-witted,” Madison, 18, says. “She at all times had a joke the place you are like, ‘Oh, I want I considered that.’ Or at all times making individuals chortle. I am unable to even bear in mind a time the place she was ever feeling down or something.”

“She’d at all times get this mac and cheese that she insisted was the worst mac and cheese ever. However that is what made her like it a lot,” says Brie, 20.

Megan, the youngest in her household, was simply “beginning to actually blossom as an individual and switch into the girl she was going to turn into,” her father says. He has his personal reminiscences to share.

In center faculty, Megan needed to undertake a Russian accent for a college play. “She stayed in character the entire yr, as a result of she switched colleges that yr,” Joe says. “Individuals really thought she was Russian. That is simply how she was. She may make any state of affairs enjoyable, and that is how she lived her life.”

She was “so liked,” he says.

“This isn’t going to be resolved this week or subsequent week,” Joe says. “If it takes the remainder of my life, that is what we’ll do.”

For those who or somebody you realize is fighting psychological well being challenges, emotional misery, substance use issues, or simply wants to speak, name or textual content 988, or chat at 988lifeline.org 24/7.