BRIGHAM CITY, Utah — Exactly three weeks after a woman's body was found in a Brigham City creek, new documents reveal that detectives were looking into her death as a possible homicide.
However, police said Wednesday that foul play is no longer suspected.
The neighbors of 61-year-old Fanny Escalona-De Angola couldn't believe it when she was found unresponsive in the Box Elder Creek on Feb. 27.
"For her to be found the way she did and me knowing her, it just didn't feel right in my heart," said her neighbor, Patricia Quiroz.
"To me, all of that just didn't make any sense because I had just barely seen her," she added.
Quiroz remembers their last interaction: a short, pleasant conversation about the weather.
"I woke up the next morning and I see all those cops here," she said.
Investigators with the Brigham City Police Department said Escalona-De Angola was last reported alive at her apartment near 500 North and Main Street. Her body was found only three blocks away near 300 West and 500 North.
Patrol officers' efforts to save her were unsuccessful.
In the affidavit for a search warrant, Cpl. Matt Knudson said she was discovered with a "ligature tied in a knot around her neck."
"Markings under the ligature suggest that it had been wrapped around the neck multiple times and fastened securely which could possibly have restricted the airway. The woman was discovered in the water without any pants," he wrote.
Detectives interviewed her husband, and he told them she was last seen in their apartment.
"It's just sad. The whole thing's sad," said Quiroz.
