Texas authorities believe that human remains discovered this week may belong to a 34-year-old woman who went missing more than two years ago.
Courtney Martin was last heard from on May 16, 2023, according to the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System. She disappeared shortly after calling her mother for a ride from an intersection, the Smith County Sheriff’s Office said, per CBS affiliate KYTX.
“The phone call to her mother was her last, and no one has seen or heard from her since,” the sheriff’s office noted in a statement two years after her disappearance, according to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, which also reported that authorities suspected foul play.
Although her last known location was less than two miles from her mother’s home, Courtney was gone by the time her mom arrived to pick her up, KYTX reported.
“We looked for her for months and months, exhausted all investigative means of finding her,” Sheriff Larry Smith said in a video shared by ABC affiliate KLTV.
Smith explained that on July 3 of this year, authorities received word that a group of young men had found a backpack belonging to Courtney near a pond in New Harmony, Texas.
He added that investigators requested assistance from a Texas Department of Public Safety dive team to search the pond, but those resources were redirected to Kerr County in response to severe flooding along the Guadalupe River.
On Tuesday, Aug. 26, when the dive team finally began its search, skeletal remains were located “almost immediately,” Sheriff Smith said. “That is what we believe to be the remains of Courtney Martin.”
Calling the discovery the start of “an all-hands-on-deck criminal investigation,” Smith confirmed the remains were taken to the Southwestern Institute of Forensic Science in Dallas for identification.
“There’ll be no I undotted or T uncrossed until this comes to a final conclusion in the investigation as to what happened to Courtney,” he emphasized.
Courtney’s mother has expressed that she feels some relief at finally having answers, though she still wants to know the full truth about her daughter’s fate. “We want to know as well,” Sheriff Smith said, according to KLTV.
The Texas Department of Public Safety and the Smith County Sheriff’s Office have not yet responded to PEOPLE’s request for additional information on the case.
