Zane Hill

Louisiana

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Lafayette police will not release the identity of a 21-year-old woman pulled out of a Girard Park drainage ditch until, at the earliest, Monday.

Cpl. Paul Mouton with the Lafayette Police Department said investigators are still informing the victim's family, which, combined with the early process of the investigation, is delaying releasing her identity.

Per police department releases and alerts, police were called to Girard Park after a group of friends reported their friend, the victim, was missing.

The friends said the victim had planned on meeting up with them at Stewart Street in the Freetown area and they last spoke to her at around 8:30 p.m. Saturday.

Three hours later, after she never arrived, the friends called her cell phone and an unknown man answered the phone, apparently telling them he found the phone somewhere in Girard Park.

Those friends went to Girard Park to meet up with that man to retrieve the cell phone. There was another unknown man with him. Both left after handing over the cell phone, Mouton said.

The friends found the victim's vehicle nearby shortly after and called police for assistance.

Police located and removed the victim's body from a drainage ditch attached to the park's pond near the entrance at around 12:10 a.m. Her cause of death remains unclear, Mouton said.

Police want to talk to the two unknown men not as suspects, but to ask them when and where they found the victim's phone and whether they have any other information.

"We're just asking them to call us for information like that," Mouton said.

Mouton said the friends could not provide a description of the two men because it was so dark and they left after returning the phone.

According to a University of Louisiana at Lafayette alert email sent to students and faculty, the victim was not a UL student.

Those with any information in this investigation are urged to contact LPD at 337-291-8200 or Lafayette Crime Stoppers at 337-232-8477.