diff --git a/Ghidra/Features/Base/src/main/java/ghidra/features/base/memsearch/format/StringSearchFormat.java b/Ghidra/Features/Base/src/main/java/ghidra/features/base/memsearch/format/StringSearchFormat.java
index 2f653af8da..af246248cd 100644
--- a/Ghidra/Features/Base/src/main/java/ghidra/features/base/memsearch/format/StringSearchFormat.java
+++ b/Ghidra/Features/Base/src/main/java/ghidra/features/base/memsearch/format/StringSearchFormat.java
@@ -48,12 +48,12 @@ class StringSearchFormat extends SearchFormat {
 		if (charset == StandardCharsets.UTF_16) {
 			charset = isBigEndian ? StandardCharsets.UTF_16BE : StandardCharsets.UTF_16LE;
 		}
-
 		// Escape sequences in the "input" are 2 Characters long.
+		String converted = input;
 		if (settings.useEscapeSequences() && inputLength >= 2) {
-			input = StringUtilities.convertEscapeSequences(input);
+			converted = StringUtilities.convertEscapeSequences(input);
 		}
-		byte[] bytes = input.getBytes(charset);
+		byte[] bytes = converted.getBytes(charset);
 		byte[] maskArray = new byte[bytes.length];
 		Arrays.fill(maskArray, (byte) 0xff);