A body matching the description of a missing Carpentersville teen was found in a Vernon Hills pond, NBC Chicago’s Regina Waldroup reports.
Editor's Note: The video in the player above is from a previous report.
The body recovered from a Vernon Hills pond Tuesday has been positively identified as Brissa Romero, a 17-year-old from Carpentersville who had gone missing last week on her way to a work holiday party, the Lake County Coroner's Office confirmed.
A preliminary autopsy revealed that Romero sustained no significant injuries, the Coroner's office said, adding that Romero's death was consistent with drowning.
Police Tuesday said the female body pulled from the pond matched Romero's description, though "formal identification of the remains" was pending confirmation from the Coroner.
The update comes two days after authorities pulled a vehicle belonging to Romero from the same retention pond, located near Lakeview Parkway and Executive Way in Vernon Hills.
According a preliminary investigation, police said evidence suggests the car was "accidentally driven into the pond after the driver failed to navigate the T-intersection."
"Video from a nearby fast food restaurant taken shortly before the phone’s last communication with area cell towers suggests Brissa was driving at the time, and there is currently no indication of foul play," police said in a release.
The footage showed Romero parking her vehicle at the restaurant, entering the building and exiting alone before she got back into car and continued driving, authorities said.
Tuesday, authorities said that "no further leads relating to Brissa’s whereabouts are being pursued at this time."
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"The men and women of both the Carpentersville and Vernon Hills Police Departments worked diligently and with sincere hope for Brissa’s safe return since she was reported missing," the departments said in a release Tuesday. "The Departments thank Brissa’s family, friends, and members of the community who worked to bring awareness to Brissa’s case and offer their deepest condolences to the Romero family."
When Brissa Romero went missing
Romero was heading to a work holiday party at Bowlero in Vernon Hills when she went missing on Dec. 4.
No one at the party saw Romero the night she disappeared, police said. Police also noted that Romero's social media accounts showed no outgoing activity since last Monday.
According to authorities, new cell phone data analysis led officers investigating the disappearance of Romero to the pond located at Lakeview Parkway and Executive Way in Vernon Hills on Monday.
Once there, an officer was approached by a resident who had discovered a backpack floating in the water. Authorities said the backpack belonged to Romero and an intense search then began.
Hours later, a vehicle matching the one Romero was driving the night she went missing was pulled from the water. One day later, a female body was pulled from the water.
Family members had said the 17-year-old was last captured on traffic cameras in the same area where her vehicle was found — near Town Center Road and Milwaukee Avenue.
“One thing about our family, we all share our locations with our parents,” Jocelyn Rubi Romero told NBC Chicago last week. “She called my mom at 6:55 p.m. and said she was on the way over here, and my mom kept looking at her location, and she was heading over here, but around the time that she arrived, she did not call my mom.”
Prior to Monday's discovery, surveillance cameras captured one of the final images of Romero before her disappearance as she returned to work in Schaumburg to retrieve her iPad around 7 p.m. that evening.
Rubi Romero said they lost Brissa Romero's location after 8 p.m.
