Eric Tutt awaits his gear being lowered down.
Eric Tutt (back) & Chris Sutherland, divers, are joined by Avinger Fire Dept and the Cass County Sheriff’s Office.
Chris Sutherland and Chris Avard lowering gear to diver waiting in water.
Paul Beard and Chris Avard getting ready to search for weapon.
Divers search for gun in area lake
No weapon was located by a dive team Friday after it scoured a private Cass County lake for what is believed to be a key piece of evidence in a sexual assault case, said Sgt. Jay Cates, with Hughes Springs Police Department.
“It a very complicated procedure,” Cates said, of the difficult process divers go through to both carefully and thoroughly search the lake floor.
The Bowie County Dive Team had no luck this weekend when they searched Simpson Lake, near Avinger for a pistol believed to be important evidence in a case of aggravated sexual assault. The team’s search of the silt-heavy, private lake was narrowed to a large area near the bridge, pointed to by a suspect in custody, as the disposal site of the gun.
The suspect, Ricardo Felipe Martinez, 39, was apprehended on Thursday, one day before police transported him to the lake site to show police where they should look for the missing weapon.
“This is the main evidence for an aggravated charge,” Cates explained. A handgun is often, but not always, the catalyst that ups a charge of sexual assault to aggravated sexual assault,” says Cates.
It is unclear if the search will pick up again this week as police continue to investigate the case.
The suspect is currently being held without bail. He is being currently being held on a sexual assault charge of a 43-year-old white female. The evidence they do have is being sent to the crime lab in Garland.
If you have any information on this case or any other case in Hughes Springs contact the Hughes Springs Police Department on Facebook or by phone.