Police ID Lake Pflugerville Drowning Victim

PFLUGERVILLE, TX — Police on Monday identified the drowning victim whose body was pulled from Lake Pflugerville last Thursday.

The victim was identified as Rafael Peña Villastrigo of Austin, police said. He was 23 years old.

Police noted the death was not considered suspicious, meaning that the man simply drowned while swimming. Police told Patch separately via email that Villastrigo was a resident of Austin.

Police first were notified abut the missing swimmer last week at around 3:24 p.m. The victim was reported to have gone under water approximately 50 feet from the North Shore of the lake without resurfacing. Pflugerville police and Travis County Emergency Services District No. 2 responded to the scene and began the search, with the Travis County Sheriff's Office dive team later called to assist when search and rescue efforts transitioned to that of a recovery operation before the body was recovered on May 17.

Villastrigo is the latest to drown in an area body of water in recent days. On May 5, a family boating outing on Lake Travis turned tragic when a 53-year-old man went underwater never to resurface. Divers were able to recover the body days later, identifying the victim as Manuel Salas, 53, of Elgin, Texas. His body has yet to be found.

That was the first drowning at Lake Travis this month. Just this past Saturday (May 19), a woman in her 20s was reported as having fallen off a party barge and never re-surfacing. Recovery efforts for her body are currently under way.

A man was pronounced dead at the scene after being pulled out of Barton Creek late Thursday, officials said. Austin-Travis County EMS medics administered CPR on the victim, a man in his 20s, but the man was pronounced dead at the scene shortly afterwards. It's unclear how long the man was underwater before he passed away. That incident occurred just before 6 p.m. along the 2200 block of Barton Springs Road, according to emergency officials.

Police on Friday identified the drowning victim whose submerged body was discovered by a park visitor near Twin Falls along the Barton Creek greenbelt last Sunday. He was identified the victim as Israel Olayemi, who was 26 years old at the time of his death.

Villastrigo's drowning also is the third to occur since the man-made reservoir was created in 2009, according to a published report. Noe Camacho, 19, of Austin drowned on June 19, 2009, while swimming with friends, according to the Austin American-Statesman. Four years later, on Nov. 22, 2013, a city employee discovered a Chevrolet sedan floating near the lake’s boat ramp, according to the Pflugerville Pflag, a Statesman community newspaper. A woman was later found in the car’s back seat, and law enforcement officials determined foul played no role in the death.

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