A Virginia medical examiner ruled that the cause of Navy Seaman Angelina Resendiz’s death remains undetermined. She was last seen May 29, 2025, at the Miller Hall barracks at Naval Station Norfolk, Va. The Naval Criminal Investigative Service announced June 10 that Resendiz’s body had been found about 10 miles from the base. (Photo courtesy of the Resendiz family)
The cause and manner of death of a sailor whose body was found this summer in the woods near Naval Station Norfolk remains undetermined, according to her family.
Esmeralda Castle, the mother of Seaman Angelina Resendiz, said Wednesday that the finding by the Virginia Medical Examiner’s Office wasn’t surprising, given the decomposed condition of her daughter’s body when it was discovered.
Castle added that while she understood the ruling, she had hoped to gain some clarity about how her 21-year-old daughter died.
“This does not change the fact that Angie lost her life and was found in a wooded area under circumstances that remain deeply troubling,” said Castle, who was notified of the medical examiner’s report on Tuesday by a Naval Criminal Investigative Service liaison.
It wasn’t clear on Wednesday whether another sailor previously held in connection with Resendiz’s death remained in pretrial detention. Stars and Stripes is not identifying the sailor because they have not been charged with a crime.
NCIS referred questions about the sailor and the status of its investigation into Resendiz’s death to the Navy’s office of information in Washington, D.C., which did not have an update on the case Wednesday.
A spokeswoman for the Virginia Medical Examiner’s Office acknowledged an email from Stars and Stripes asking for more information but couldn’t immediately offer a response Wednesday.
A cause of death can be classified as undetermined “when the information pointing to one manner of death is no more compelling than one or more other competing manners of death in thorough consideration of all available information,” according to the National Association of Medical Examiners.
Resendiz, a culinary specialist assigned to the destroyer USS James E. Williams, was first reported missing May 29.
But it wasn’t until June 3 — five days after she was last seen or in contact with family and friends — that a statewide missing adult alert was issued.
That lag occurred because the Navy initially considered Resendiz absent without official leave, an action that has drawn criticism from her family and congressional inquiries into the handling of her disappearance.
It has also drawn comparisons to the death of Army Spc. Vanessa Guillen, whose killing in 2020 led to Defense Department policy reforms on sexual harassment and sexual assault.
Twelve days after Resendiz was first reported missing, her body was found June 9 in a wooded area about 10 miles from NS Norfolk and returned to her family later that month. A memorial service was held June 27 in Brownsville, Texas.
Castle said closure in her daughter’s death cannot come until the truth is revealed, and accountability will not take place until the circumstances are fully explained.
“We cannot accept this as the end of the story,” Castle said in the statement, adding that her family would continue to “seek truth, justice and change so that no other family endures this kind of loss.”
