The Disappearance and Murder of Sierra Lamar
Her body still hasn’t been found after 10 years
Unfortunately, hundreds of thousands of people go missing every year in the United States. But personally, Sierra Lamar’s case in 2012 is all the more tragic because it literally “hits home.” Lamar was born and raised in Fremont, California — the same place I would consider my hometown — before moving to Morgan Hill where she disappeared.
She was described as a funny, playful, and bright person. In high school, she was a cheerleader with a big social life: everything was going perfectly fine in Fremont.
When Lamar’s parents divorced, she and her mother moved to Morgan Hill. Sierra was 15 at the time, but little did she know that on March 16, 2012, while waiting at a bus stop for school, it would be the last anyone would know of her.
The Day of her Disappearance
On what seemed like a normal school day, Sierra got up from bed at around six in the morning to get ready for the day. She posted a quick selfie to social media, left her house at around 7:15, and walked a few blocks to her unofficial bus stop. The land around Sierra’s house was very empty and vacant, so only she would be picked up at her bus stop.
After leaving, Sierra’s mother, Marlene, sent a couple text messages, reminding Sierra of the house chores to do after school. Sierra never responded to these texts, but her mother suspected that she was just busy with school work.
After Marlene got off work at 3:45 pm, she called Sierra to make sure everything was okay. Sierra never picked up. Marlene understandably became worried, so she headed home to see if Sierra had made it back from school. And it turned out, Sierra was also not home. Marlene then went to Sierra’s high school, and that’s where she found out Sierra never even made it to class. Why didn’t the office alert Marlene earlier, I don’t know.
With nothing else to do, Marlene called police and reported her daughter as missing.
The Investigation
Police first check security footage on the bus, and it turned out that Sierra didn’t make it on the bus in the first place. Thus, concluding that between leaving home and walking to the bus stop, something wrong happened. They also checked footage from previous days, but nothing suspicious stood out.
Authorities began searching around the area, and the following day (March 17), they find Sierra’s phone. But upon inspection, the phone provided no meaningful clues.
Next day, they began searching around a shed a few miles from Sierra’s home. That is where they find her black bag between the shed and a cactus. In the bag, police find Sierra’s jeans, shoes, and San Jose Sharks sweater she was wearing the day she disappeared. Police take the bag and its contents for DNA testing.
It is then they find DNA that matches Antolin Garcia-Torres, who was then 21-years old. He lived seven miles away from Sierra’s bus stop, and he had already been previously in trouble do to a felony assault in 2009.
The Culprit
After the discovery, police begin a 24-hour surveillance on Antolin. They check security footage from the trailer park where he lived with his mother, and they see his red, Volkswagon Jetta leaving the park just 15 minutes before Sierra would have left home for the bus stop.
Police take Antolin in for questioning, and he claims that after leaving his home, he went on a solo fishing trip. There were no witnesses or anything else to confirm the trip, so police straight up ask him how his DNA was found on Sierra’s bag.
When I first heard Atonlin’s response, I didn’t even know what to say. Antolin told police that he likes to “pleasure” himself while in his car, and then uses a tissue for cleanup. He then explains that he would throw the tissue(s) out of the car, and maybe that one of these tissues landed on Sierra’s bag.
Police reasonably weren’t buying it, and after hearing witnesses say that they saw the exact same car Antolin drives near the bus stop at the time of Sierra’s disappearance, they began checking Antolin’s car. In it, they find Sierra’s hair wrapped around rope in the trunk and her fingerprints on the rear door handle.
Trial
With this shocking new evidence, police finally arrested Antolin. He was charged with kidnap and murder. Antolin pleaded not guilty, and continued to claim that he had no idea who Sierra was. Even his mother claimed that Antolin was innocent, and did not commit the charged crimes. The trial did not begin until 2017, and it was revealed that in 2009, Antolin attempted to kidnap three separate women in the parking lot of a Safeway in Morgan Hill. Then on May 9, 2017, the jury found Antolin guilty of all charges. He was sentenced to life in jail, with no possibility of parole.
Even after everything, Antolin still will not answer any questions related to Sierra, or where her body is. Volunteers are still unofficially searching, and Sierra’s family have stated that they have found “peace” knowing that Anotlin will not be able to harm any more women. But it just seems wrong that Sierra’s fate is still a mystery, and I hope that her family will one day be able to have a full closure in knowing what ultimately happened.
