Last week, we walked through the timeline of Troy Galloway’s disappearance and the events that unfolded in the days leading up to January 13, 2016. We learned how, after years of building a life and a steady support network in Santa Cruz, California, Troy moved to Sonora with his wife, placing hours of distance between himself and the people who had always been his safety net. Troy was a devoted father to his young son, but the distance made it difficult to maintain that same level of involvement in his life after the move.

On January 15, 2016, Troy’s mother, Nancy, received a message from his wife telling her that Troy had disappeared two days earlier. Nancy was confused and alarmed by what she was hearing. His wife said Troy had run out of the house, underdressed for the cold, and never returned. After that exchange, Troy was finally reported missing, but a miscommunication between local agencies delayed getting the case to the appropriate investigators and beginning the search for Troy.

Over time, pieces of information slowly came together. Neighbors recalled hearing a disturbance at Crystal Falls Lake on the night Troy vanished. Years later, advances in technology enabled investigators to interpret Troy’s phone data with greater clarity, suggesting that his phone had been near the lake around the time he disappeared. For a long time, this became the guiding theory: that Troy had somehow ended up in the water.

That idea guided the investigation, culminating in an extensive, highly coordinated search effort. Crystal Falls Lake was drained, scanned, and combed through by forensic specialists, dogs, and sonar teams. But when the search turned up no trace of Troy or his belongings, the explanation that had once seemed most likely suddenly stood on shaky ground. If Troy wasn’t in the lake, then the story everyone had been leaning on for years no longer fit, and the investigation was forced back to its earliest questions.

This week, we’re going to dig deeper into what Troy’s loved ones learned about his time in Sonora, what they began to uncover about the dynamics within his marriage, and the questions that still haunt Troy’s family as they enter the tenth year of searching for answers.

If you have any information about the disappearance of Troy Galloway, please contact the Tuolumne County Sheriff’s Office at (209) 533-5855.

If you have a missing loved one that you would like to have featured on the show, please fill out our case submission form.

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Troy Galloway Part 2: The Brainstormers

The Vanished Podcast