Raven Gileau did not use her cell phone the night she died

Rashah Mcchesney

Raven Gileau did not send or receive any phone calls or text messages between the time she and her companions went out to Campustown, and when she disappeared, according to Ames Police.

Gileau, sophomore in accounting, was found early April 25 alongside the Union Pacific Railroad tracks near 13th Street and Ontario Avenue after her roommate called and reported her missing.

Ames Police Cmdr. Mike Brennan said Gileau didn’t make any phone calls or text messages.

“There are indications that people tried to call her after she was missing,” Brennan said. “But there were no conversations.”

Ames Police searched near the 13th and Ontario train bridge because a companion Gileau left Project 20/20, 2424 Lincoln Way, with the night she died left her there to take shelter from the storm, Cmdr. Brennan said. Around the time they began the search, Union Pacific employees reported seeing something large lying near the tracks and police found Gileau’s body soon after.

When Gileau was found, she had not only her cell phone in her purse but also the IDs of some of the people she had gone out with the previous evening.

“She carried the others IDs and keys that night, debit cards and the like,” Brennan said.

In a previous interview, one of the club owners at Project 20/20 and the student whose birthday party Gileau attended at the club that night said she did not drink while she was at the club.

However, Brennan said Gileau’s companions that evening said they and Gileau had been drinking both before they went to the club and while they were at the club.

Brennan said it was still unclear why Gileau ended up on the tracks that night; and while her injuries were consistent with being hit by a train, the tapes Ames police retrieved from Union Pacific do not show a collision. 

Police are still waiting for the results of the autopsy and toxicology reports to help determine the specific cause of her death, as well as the possibility that the tapes from the trains could be enhanced to give more details.