The body of a California woman who vanished after telling her family she was going to the gym has been found 12 days after she was last seen alive, according to authorities.
Sara Celeste Otero was found dead at the bottom of a cliff in a remote part of Camp Pendleton in Oceanside, an Oceanside Police spokesperson confirmed to The Independent on Wednesday.
Police officers had found Ms Otero’s grey Subaru Outback abandoned at Vista Point close to Interstate 5 on Tuesday afternoon and began searching the area for signs of the missing 28-year-old.
Her body was spotted soon after on the cliffs below a restricted training area of the Marine base, police said.
A helicopter was used to retrieve her body before she was officially identified by the medical examiner as the missing woman.
The police spokesperson said that there were no signs of foul play but that an autopsy would be carried out to determine her cause of death.
Ms Otero had not been seen since the morning of 28 January when she left her mother’s home in Oceanside at around 8.40am, telling her father she was going to the gym.
Her family said she had also told a friend she may go to the beach.
The 28-year-old failed to show up for work at Mission Avenue Bar and Grill in downtown Oceanside that evening. Phone records show her cellphone was turned off at around 10am that morning and wasn’t switched on since, according to her family.
The discovery of her body came just hours after Ms Otero’s stepbrother Ryan Bear told The Independent that his stepsister seemed to be in a better place recently and had told people how things were “starting to look up”.
The 28-year-old had struggled with depression in the past but had recently met a new boyfriend and things were going “exceedingly well” between them, he said.
Mr Bear said that it was out of character for her to have no contact with her friends or family for days on end and that she had never not shown up for work.
“She’s taken time for herself before but she always let family or friends know,” he said.
“She was in a decent place. She had gone through some slight depression but had vocalised that things were starting to look up and that she had reasons to live and things were improving.”
Ms Otero met her new boyfriend about four or five months ago and told her stepbrother she had “a lot of hope” for their relationship.
“I’ve never met him but I’ve heard from Sara that things were going exceedingly well,” said Mr Bear.
“She said he is a very kind man and felt like she had found a good guy,” he said, adding that he didn’t know of any “issues” in their relationship.
The family did not believe her boyfriend had anything to do with her disappearance, said Mr Bear, adding that he had also been “emotionally distraught” since she went missing.
Mr Bear said that he and his stepsister had made plans to go on a hike together the day after she went missing.
He said he last saw her around two weeks ago and they decided to plan the hike for Saturday 29 January.
They had been texting throughout the week making arrangements for the trip when Ms Otero suddenly “went quiet” on the Friday – the day she was last seen alive.
“She had gone dark on making plans so I knew something was up,” he said.
On the day his sister’s body was discovered, Mr Bear made a heartbreaking direct appeal to her urging her to come “home”.
“You’re loved, you’re cared about, your family deeply wants to see you safe and sound and we will do everything in our power to help you make it home,” he said.
