Vigil Held For 19-Year-Old Woman Left By Roadside With Fatal Stab Wounds
SAN JOSE (CBS SF) -- A vigil was held Tuesday night for a 19-year-old Tracy woman found with fatal stab wounds early
Monday morning in unincorporated Livermore.
A motorist found Lizette Andrea Cuesta with multiple stab wounds near Tesla Road in eastern Alameda County at 2:06 a.m. Monday, according to Sgt. Ray Kelly.
Family and friends gathered and tears flowed as loved ones held candles to honor the life Cuesta.
More than 100 people met at Great Oaks Skate Park in South San Jose, where they say you could often find her doing what she loved.
"She was a local at this park, she would always be here," said her friend Christian. "She'd always be falling and getting back up, that's Liz. Take a hard fall and get back up."
Her relative Joana Cervantez said, "She was a very happy person, very friendly, kind."
Cuesta had moved to Tracy to live with her father.
Her father, Ray Cuesta, said, "She brought peace to herself and she brought peace to me... "
The Alameda County Sheriff's Office says Cuesta was brutally beaten and stabbed before she was dumped near Tesla Road early yesterday morning. She crawled some 100 yards - before a Good Samaritan spotted her and called 911. He got out and comforted her before paramedics arrived.
She was airlifted to Eden Medical Center in Castro Valley and was pronounced dead around 4:30 a.m.
Investigators believe Cuesta was killed with malice aforethought, dumped from a vehicle and left for dead. She crawled on her stomach 100 yards or more before being found.
Two suspects, a 19-year-old man and a 19-year-old woman, were arrested in Modesto after Cuesta made a "very compelling dying declaration" about who stabbed her, Kelly said.
The night of the killing, authorities say all three got into the car together.
Kelly has identified the engaged couple as Daniel Gross, 19, of Modesto, and 25-year-old Melissa Leonardo, who are both in custody at Santa Rita Jail in Dublin on no-bail status.
Roberto Cuesta, the victim's uncle, said, "I hope those people pay for that, it's just who would do that? Come to the house, call her to have a drink whatever, coffee, and then do that, it's just horrible, it's evil."
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