Student Found in Car Died of Stab Wounds

The Cal State Fullerton honor student whose body was found stuffed in the trunk of her car died from multiple stab wounds, police said Sunday.

Placentia police spokeswoman Corrine Loomis said further tests are needed on the body of Cathy Torrez before a time of death can be determined. Loomis declined to say whether a motive or a suspect have been identified in the case.

The family of the 20-year-old woman, who had been missing since Feb. 12, issued a statement Sunday, saying: “Whatever happened never should have happened. Nobody had a right to take (Cathy) away so young. . . . It would be pretty impossible to find a person who didn’t like her. To begin to think about whoever did this to her is impossible.”

The body of Torrez, a junior sociology major, was discovered Saturday, a week after she vanished after leaving work. Patrol officers found her 1990 burgundy Toyota Corolla with the body in the trunk in the Placentia-Linda Community Hospital parking lot, but investigators do not know how long the car had been there.

Nor has it been determined, officers said, where Torrez encountered her attacker. She was last seen about 8 p.m. on Feb. 12 driving alone out of the parking lot of the Sav-on Drugstore where she worked part time as a checker.

Described as a responsible woman who did not like to be out alone, Torrez lived with her family and had called her mother only minutes before she left work, saying she would be home soon.

A family spokesman said that Torrez had been friends with a young man who had tried to kill himself the week before she disappeared, but that they were not romantically involved.