An 18-year-old UC Irvine freshman, whose death in January led to an interim suspension for a campus fraternity, died of alcohol intoxication, the county coroner announced today.
“He just drank too much,” said a caller to 9-1-1 dispatch to report that Noah Domingo was not breathing Jan. 12 at an off-campus residence on Sycamore Drive in Irvine. Police found him lying on a bed there that morning, and he was later declared dead at the scene.
The Orange County Sheriff’s Department Coroner Division, which held off on revealing a cause of death pending the results of toxicology tests, announced today that “accidental acute ethanol intoxication” was determined to be the cause.
“At the time of Domingo’s death, estimated to be approximately 3:30 a.m., his blood alcohol level was detected to be approximately 0.331,” reads a sheriff’s department statement. “Toxicology tests did not detect any additional substances in his system at the time of his death.”
The statement ends with: “We extend our deepest sympathies to the Domingo family for their loss.”
The university placed Sigma Alpha Epsilon on interim suspension pending the Irvine Police Department investigation, which UCI and the fraternity pledged to cooperate with.
“The Irvine Police Department is actively investigating this case,” police Lt. Mark Anderson said today. “At the conclusion of our investigation, we will present our findings to the district attorney’s office, which will determine whether charges are warranted.”
Domingo, a graduate of Crescenta Valley High School in La Crescenta, where he played football and basketball, followed his 20-year-old sister Brianna to UCI, where he majored in biology and dreamed of becoming involved in sports medicine for a basketball team.
Brianna Domingo told the Los Angeles Times that her brother spent the week before his death balancing intense studying with Sigma Alpha Epsilon’s winter rush week, which concluded with an event the night before that 9-1-1 call.
A GoFundMe campaign for the Domingo family has so far raised nearly $38,000, which is more than triple the original $10,000 goal.
OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.