A young woman whose body was found Saturday at UCSB’s Campus Point may have died from a fall from the cliffs in Isla Vista, the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Department said Tuesday.
The exact cause of death is pending toxicology results, but an autopsy revealed that Giselle Esme Ayala, a 18-year-old sociology freshman at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, “had injuries consistent with a fall,” said Sheriff Bill Brown.
An on-campus memorial/vigil for Ayala is scheduled for 6 p.m. Monday, April 15 in the University Union Plaza.
Ayala, who was from Santa Rosa, had traveled on Friday with a group of friends to Isla Vista for the annual spring break party known as “Deltopia,” according to the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Department.
She and her friends partied in Isla Vista Friday night, and she was last see at about 11 p.m., according to the Sheriff’s Department.
Her body was found in the surf west of Campus Point at 8:20 a.m. Saturday by a jogger, and her friends reported her missing Saturday night, according to the Sheriff’s Department.
Assuming she fell to the shore below, Ayala could have ended up in the water, and been carried down the coast toward Campus Point by lateral currents.
The high tide Friday night was 4.5 feet at about 8 p.m., dropping to a low of 1.1 feet at 1:48 a.m. Saturday. The next high tide was 4.8 feet at 7:45 a.m., about a half hour before Ayala’s body was found.
Sheriff’s officials have said it will be four to six weeks before toxicology results on Ayala are available.
— Noozhawk executive editor Tom Bolton can be reached at tbolton@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.