“Yes.”
“From whom did that information come?”
“From a former girlfriend of Mr. Mercer,” Burke said. “Katie Martin.”
“Without getting into everything Ms. Martin has already told the jury,” Reid said, “once you had that information, what did you do?”
“We treated it as a lead,” Burke said. “We pulled old maps and incident reports on Riverbend. Specifically, we looked at the grading logs from the week she vanished. We confirmed what the property looked like at the time Caroline disappeared, and set up a search.”
“What kind of search?”
“K-9 first,” Burke said. “We brought out our dogs under the cover of a training exercise so we didn’t alarm the neighborhood. When both dogs alerted on the same spot in a greenway area, we marked it. Came back early the next morning with equipment.”
“And what happened then?”
“We had a bobcat take off shallow layers of soil. Third pass, we saw fabric.”
“Did you stop work at that point?”
“Yes. We called Dr. Cade and treated it as a potential crime scene.”
Reid nodded.
“Prior to receiving Ms. Martin’s tip, had your office investigated Caroline’s disappearance?”
“For years,” Burke said. “We followed up on tips, re-interviewed witnesses, and worked with State and federal partners. We never had a body. Never had a crime scene. Just a missing person.”
“Sheriff, to be clear, did your office use K-9s during the initial 2017 search?”
“We did,” Burke said. “The K-9s tracked her from the car down the highway embankment, but the trail stopped dead at the treeline. By the time we moved the search toward the Riverbend site a few days later, a ten-foot-high berm of fill dirt had been placed for the retaining wall. It created a massive physical barrier between us and the wooded area behind it. We couldn't get the dogs or the equipment back there.
“And Ms. Martin’s information was the first specific reference you had to Riverbend as a burial site?”
“That’s right.”
“Thank you, Sheriff. No further questions at this time.”
Reid sat.
Judge Harlan turned his attention to the defense.
“Ms. Harper?”
Eleanor rose.
“Ms. Martin waited nearly six years after the end of that relationship to come to you. Correct?”
“Yes.”
“And you knew, by the time you received that information, that she was an ex-girlfriend of David Mercer.”
“Yes.”
“An ex-girlfriend who was angry about how the relationship ended.”
Burke’s gaze stayed level.
“I knew she wasn’t happy with him, yes.”
