A College of General Studies freshman who went missing early Sunday morning for nearly 30 hours returned safely to her residence hall around 8 a.m. yesterday, according to her friends.
Sara Vasquez, who had been last seen Sunday morning at Mantra, a nightclub and lounge, returned to Warren Towers at around 8 a.m. yesterday and signed into the dormitory because she had lost her Terrier Card.
Vasquez went missing sometime between 1 a.m. and 2 a.m. Sunday morning after visiting the club with about 10 other freshmen from Warren. She was last seen with an unidentified white male, according to reports compiled by her friends.
Vasquez is "completely safe," and "everything was completely fine," said CGS freshman Rissa Freedman.
Vasquez said she left the club by herself and was not coerced or held against her will.
"I wanted to leave," she said. "My feet were killing me. I was like, all right, it's time to go."
Vasquez said she spent the night with a friend, and because her cell phone battery had died, she was unable to contact anyone. She would not comment about where she stayed or why she did not use her friend's phone to contact anyone.
College of Arts and Sciences freshman Brian Koehler said Sunday that at exactly 3 a.m. that morning, he received what he thought was a suspicious text from Vasquez's phone. The text was unsolicited and read, "I'm home and fine." Her friends tried to contact her after the text message was sent but could not reach her.
Though Koehler said he was originally suspicious of the message because he said Vasquez was not in the state of mind to type with perfect spelling and grammar, Vasquez said her Sidekick cell phone automatically punctuates text messages.
"I was trying my best to put out a coherent text message," she said.
After she entered Warren yesterday morning, Vasquez said she approached security guards with her driver's license and other photo identification. The guards told her many people were looking for her.
"I knew something was wrong," Vasquez said.
Vasquez said the hardest part about discovering people had been searching for her yesterday morning was seeing her mother, who had come up to Boston from Providence, R.I. when she heard of Vasquez's disappearance.
"It was pretty difficult for me . . . seeing my mom crying," she said. "[It was] not the best feeling in the world."
When Vasquez was returning to Warren from the BU East T stop yesterday morning, she spotted one of the 10 friends she was with Saturday night at Mantra.
"He looked like he'd seen a ghost," she said, adding the friend then said, "Sara . . . I thought you were dead."
Vasquez said she was thankful, however, for her friends' quick thinking and the publication of her name and last-known location, as well as "the BU community for being genuinely concerned."
"I feel bad," she said. "Because of my irresponsible behavior, a lot of people were in a panic. Because I couldn't call people, because of my actions, people had to worry, and I feel horrible."
Be the first to comment on this article!
Log in to be able to post comments.