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UC Irvine student dies at electronic music festival

SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. >> A 22-year-old man who died earlier this month after a seizure at an electronic music festival in San Bernardino County was a University of California, Irvine senior.

The Orange County Register reports that John Hoang Dinh Vo of San Diego was majoring in biological sciences and mourned on social media by members of his Lambda Theta Delta fraternity.

“You will always be here with us spiritually,” one man wrote on Instagram with a photo of him and Vo. Another photo showed a makeshift memorial of candles, cigarettes, Vodka bottles and Rockstar Energy Drink cans surrounding Vo’s fraternity photo.

Vo was at the Beyond Wonderland event at the San Manuel Amphitheater on March 20 when coroner’s officials say “he apparently suffered a possible seizure and went into cardiac arrest” at about 10:15 p.m.

He was taken to Loma Linda Medical Center and pronounced dead at 11:08 p.m. His cause of death hasn’t been released.

He died on the first night of the massive gathering hosted by Insomniac Events, which stopped hosting events at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum after a 15-year-old girl took ecstasy at the Electric Daisy Carnival and died in 2010.

Electronic music events were banned at most San Bernardino County-owned facilities in 2010 after the overdose death in Los Angeles, but it didn’t affect events at the amphitheater by Live Nation. The entertainment company subleases the amphitheater to Insomniac for Beyond Wonderland and other festivals.

Insomniac spokeswoman Jennifer Forkish called Vo’s death “heartbreaking” in a statement.

“While the cause of his passing will take time to determine, what we do know is that somewhere his family and friends are grieving,” she wrote. “To them we extend our thoughts and prayers during this difficult time.”

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