New Clue in Case of ASU Student Killed During Robbery Attempt

There's a new clue in the death of Kyleigh Sousa, the ASU student killed during a robbery-gone-wrong this past May, and the Tempe Police Department needs the public's help to answer a few questions the clues have raised.

Tempe police Sergeant Steve Carbajal tells New Times a driver's license that was taken during the robbery was mailed back to the person to whom it was issued -- a friend of Sousa's whose license was in her purse that was stolen during the robbery.

Carbajal says the problem is that it's hard to determine from where the license was retrieved by the Postal Service.

All the police know is that it was dropped in a U.S. Postal Service mailbox somewhere in the metro-Phoenix area sometime between May 26, and June 20.

Peter Hass, a Postal Service spokesman, tells New Times the reason it might be difficult to track the exact box in which the license was dropped is because, after the contents of a box are collected, they're taken to a processing center to be sorted.

Unless the license was sitting directly on top of the pile of mail in the box, it's likely it wasn't noticed until it was already at the processing center -- mixed in with mail from hundreds of boxes -- making it virtually impossible to determine which box it came from.

 

The incident happened on the morning of Wednesday May 26, when Tempe police responded to a call that a female had been run over near the International House of Pancakes on Apache Boulevard in Tempe.

Police say Sousa was approached by a heavy-set Hispanic male in a newer model, silver Chrysler 300 or Dodge Charger (pictured).

The suspect, police say, grabbed Sousa's purse and tried to drive away, but Sousa got tangled and was dragged several feet by the vehicle. She died the next day.

Police ask that anyone who has placed a driver's license in a Postal Service mailbox between May 26 and June 20 to call the Tempe department at 480-350-8311 or Silent Witness at 480-WITNESS.