SAN DIEGO – A 21-year-old woman was killed Friday morning after apparently falling from a ninth-story balcony onto the pavement below in the Core-Columbia neighborhood of downtown, San Diego police said.

Marcella Holman

She was identified as Marcella Maria Holman, an investigator with the county Medical Examiner's Office said.

Holman was on the balcony of the Acqua Vista condominiums at the corner of Ash and Columbia streets around 3:05 a.m. with some friends when she apparently slipped and fell over the railing, said Sgt. Kerry Tom.

Tom said there may have been a party at the condo when the fall occurred. Police were interviewing several witnesses.

“At the time, right now, it appears accidental,” Tom said.

According to her Myspace page, Holman, who went by the nickname “Marci,” was attending the Art Institute of California, San Diego, and worked as a cocktail waitress at the Hard Rock Hotel.

Officials at the marketing office of the hotel, located in downtown San Diego's Gaslamp Quarter, declined Friday to either confirm or deny that Holman worked there, and said they were not making any comments.

The manager of the secured condo complex where the accident occurred did not return a call for comment Friday afternoon.

At the building, a ninth-floor resident said he heard noise and yelling about 3 a.m., then saw people running down the hallway and then downstairs.

A man who lives on the 13th floor, who also did not want to be named, said he was aware of the accident, but said none of the residents have officially been told anything. He said signs are sometimes posted in the building's elevator to distribute news that affects residents.

Inside another condo on the ninth floor, a group of men and women who appeared to be about college age said they did not want to talk to a reporter.

When asked about the incident, one of them said it was the “worst possible time” to be asked for a comment.

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