Calif. Teen Missing Since New Year’s Eve Found Dead
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ABC News(SAN FRANCISCO) — Authorities have found the body of Alyssa Byrne, the 19-year-old California woman who had been missing since New Year’s Eve.
Byrne, of Petaluma, Calif., was last seen by friends at Snow Globe, a three-day music festival in South Lake Tahoe, Nev., that attracts thousands of people, police said. One friend says Byrne quietly disappeared from her group of friends around 11:30 p.m. that night without saying a word.
Her body was discovered by a utility worker in a snow bank along the road between the Snow Globe Festival and a hotel, the Douglas County Sheriff’s Department said in a news conference Friday, according to ABC affiliate KGO-TV in San Francisco. No foul play is suspected and the family has been notified.
Police are investigating Byrne’s cellphone activity, which shows calls were placed around midnight Monday after she was last seen. Investigators are unsure, however, whether the phone was used by Byrne or someone else.
Byrne reportedly told friends she was returning to the group’s hotel, the Horizon Casino Resort, in Stateline.
“She basically just left and I called her back and she was on the bus back to the hotel,” said Jay Donnellan, according to KGO-TV.
When Donnellan returned to the hotel around 12:30 a.m., Byrne was not in her room.
“Once we got back to the room, we noticed she wasn’t there. We were calling her, back-to-back, sending her text messages,” Donnellan told KGO.
Byrne’s family in Petaluma said before Friday’s discovery that she had no history of running away.
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