Remains Found in California Identified as Nursing Student

Badly decomposed human remains found Saturday near a dirt trail in Sunol, Calif., about 50 miles (80 km) southeast of San Francisco, are those of missing nursing student Michelle Le, police said.

Le was last seen at the hospital parking garage in May.

The body was discovered in very bad condition and decomposed to the point where the gender could not be determined, but tests by the Alameda County coroner confirmed that it belongs to the 26-year-old Le, Hayward police said.

The autopsy has not yet been able to determine the cause or the manner of death. Hayward police declined further comment.

Police said Le and her former school friend’s cell phone signals had been received from the area where she was found.

Giselle Esteban, 27, a woman who went to high school with Le in San Diego, was arrested last week and charged with murder.

Tonight, our family has been notified that this weekend, we have found Michelle, Krystine Dinh, a family spokeswoman, told CBS in an e-mail. Please continue praying for and supporting Michelle as our family begins the journey to ensure justice in her honor.

According to prosecutors, Esteban, who is pregnant, attacked Le in the hospital parking garage where she was last seen.

Video surveillance cameras in the hospital garage had footage of Le's white Honda SUV leaving later that evening, but it could not be determined who was driving it. The vehicle was found a few blocks away, according to police.

The 26-year-old nursing student who grew up in San Diego County was reported missing on May 27. She went for a break during her shift at the Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Hayward and never returned.

At the time of her disappearance, Le was working on a bachelor's degree program at the Samuel Merritt University in Oakland, combining classroom work with clinical training, CBS reported.