Girl Found Dead on Morning After Prom

Jacqueline Gomez had partied all night with her date, witnesses say
By Neal Colgrass,  Newser Staff
Posted May 18, 2014 6:02 PM CDT
Girl Found Dead Morning After Prom
   (Shutterstock)

A teenage girl celebrated her prom night by partying in a hotel room with her date, and ended up dead the next morning—possibly from a mix of alcohol and prescription painkillers, KHOU reports. Jacqueline Gomez, 17, was excited about her MacArthur High School prom in Houston, showing her dress to friends and asking for advice on doing her nails, reports the Houston Chronicle. And once the event at a Hyatt Hotel was over, she went upstairs with her date. "I told her right before left—she left early—I told her, 'Come here,'" said a friend, who whispered in her ear: "'Just please be safe, Jackie.' And I gave her a hug, and she left."

A woman staying down the hall tells ABC13 she heard partying in the room all night and knocked on the door "to see if anything was going on, but they didn't answer." The next morning, Jacqueline's date frantically called 911 saying she wasn't breathing. He later told police they had been drinking, and police suspect painkillers were involved too. "We have no reason to believe that he at all contributed to this death," said a detective. "But in my line of work, you have to be absolutely sure." A friend of Jacqueline's said her "heart sank" when she heard the news: "I hoped it really wasn't her. I didn't want to believe it. She was an amazing girl." (More high school prom stories.)

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