Death of a Showgirl

Summary

Podcast Summary: "Death of a Showgirl"

Podcast: 20/20 (ABC News)
Airdate: April 18, 2026
Theme: The mysterious disappearance and tragic murder of Vegas showgirl Debbie Flores Narvaez, the investigation that followed, and the lasting effects of the case.

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Main Theme & Purpose

This 20/20 episode deeply investigates the life and brutal death of Debbie Flores Narvaez, a talented Las Vegas showgirl whose disappearance shocked her family, friends, and the entertainment world. Through in-depth interviews, exclusive statements, and investigative storytelling, the podcast reconstructs the events leading to her murder, the personal and toxic relationships surrounding her, the arduous law enforcement investigation, and the lingering emotional scars left on loved ones.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Debbie’s Life, Ambitions, and Character

• Background & Personality

  • Debbie was "a girl who has beauty, who has talent, who can be seductive... She's beautiful. She's sexy. She is Las Vegas." (Friend of Debbie, 00:33-00:44)
  • Born in Puerto Rico, moved to Maryland—she and her sister Celeste were very close.
  • Known for her big personality, warmth, and energy. (“Before you even see her, you're going to hear her voice. She has this very, very loud, raspy voice.” — Celeste, 13:43)

• Ambitions

  • Passionate about dancing since childhood, she also excelled academically, graduating with a degree in international business.
  • Worked at a prestigious Baltimore law firm but found it unfulfilling compared to her love for dance (14:31-15:09).
  • Moved to Las Vegas to pursue her dream, winning roles in major shows, including Fantasy and a coveted solo with pop star Sisqó (04:36, 05:01).

2. Debbie’s Disappearance and Initial Investigation

• Timeline of Disappearance

  • Debbie goes missing before a crucial rehearsal, an event completely out of character for her (01:09-01:54, 06:08).
  • Family, roommates, and friends react with immediate concern, and a missing persons report is quickly filed (07:08-07:32).

• Immediate Suspicions

  • Friends and family fear that Debbie’s visibility as a performer and social media presence put her at risk (08:10-08:48).
  • Surveillance footage shows Debbie leaving her apartment alone, dressed for rehearsal—a critical timestamp in the case (18:14-18:35).

3. Relationships and Theories

• Love Life and Volatile Relationships

  • Debbie had a history of tumultuous relationships, most notably with two men:
    • Jameel McGhee, ex-boyfriend, dancer, once accused of domestic violence and sued (29:13-31:12).
    • Jason “Blue” Griffith, Vegas dancer—her last known boyfriend, with a reputation for multiple relationships and infidelity (32:00-34:10).

• Toxic Dynamics

  • Both Debbie and Jason had called 911 on each other; their relationship was marred by fights, property damage, and mutual accusations of abuse and instability (40:29-41:22).
  • “Debbie for sure wanted a serious monogamous relationship. Debbie was not the type of woman that was not going to agree to just be someone’s side piece.” (Friend of Debbie, 40:43)
  • The tumult contributed to suspicions and an evolving police focus from missing person to likely homicide.

4. Breakthroughs in the Case

• Discovery of the Car

  • Debbie’s car found abandoned and hidden, her boots and belongings still inside—a major red flag for investigators (22:32-24:21).

• Revelations from Witnesses

  • Interviews with Jason's ex-girlfriend Agnes, and later with another ex, Kalei, provide crucial leads. Kalei, out of fear, reveals her belief Jason killed Debbie—implicating Jason’s roommate, Louis Colombo (47:30-48:23).

• The Confession

  • Colombo eventually confesses his involvement, breaking down the sequence:
    • An argument between Debbie and Jason became physical; Colombo leaves and returns to find Debbie dead, a plastic bag over her head (50:45-51:22).
    • Jason and Colombo attempt to dispose of Debbie’s body by encasing her in concrete inside storage bins, moving her body using a U-Haul (53:31-54:43).

5. Gruesome Details and the Crime Scene

• Body Disposal
  • Multiple attempts to hide the body: first in concrete in the garage, then moving it to an abandoned house. Debbie's body is eventually dismembered to fit into separate bins (57:21-58:18).
  • Police are led to the house, uncover the remains, and find direct forensic evidence linking Jason and Louie to the crime (60:12-62:14).
  • “She had been dismembered in two parts and put in the two bins with cement and plastic, thinking that would help with the odor, but it never does.” (Investigator, 61:03)

6. Legal Proceedings and Aftermath

• Arrest and Interrogation

  • Jason continually denies responsibility in police interrogations, shifting to requesting a lawyer (65:52-67:14).
  • He is charged with second-degree murder but not with dismemberment (67:21-67:41).

• Trial

  • Prosecution’s case built on witness testimony (including Colombo’s immunity deal), evidence of a prolonged and violent relationship, and Jason’s own lies under oath (72:25-78:34).
  • Defense portrays Debbie as unstable and violent, expanding on their tumultuous history (74:41-76:16).
  • The jury convicts Jason of second-degree murder; he’s sentenced to 10 years to life (79:04-80:00).

• Parole and Final Reflections

  • Jason remains incarcerated, repeatedly denied parole, and expresses remorse in a 20/20 phone call—Celeste, Debbie’s sister, continues to oppose his release at every hearing (82:06-82:48, 80:00-80:20).

7. Emotional Fallout and Legacy

• Family and Friends’ Grief
  • Celeste describes ongoing pain, “Depression is…an everyday fight. The more I talk about my sister, the easier it has become.” (85:25)
  • Friends remember Debbie as “so beautiful inside and out. Her spirit was so warm, so welcoming.” (86:02)
  • Debbie’s body is returned to Puerto Rico, “where she sits on this beautiful mountain…her spirit is still with me.” (86:24)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Debbie’s Character:

  • “Debbie breathes dancing.” — Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister), [00:52]
  • “She could really charm you with just a single look.” — Friend of Debbie, [13:55]

• On Vegas Showgirl Life:

  • “Sometimes being pretty puts you at risk. I can tell you from personal experience how scary Vegas can be.” — Friend of Debbie, [00:59]

• On Toxic Relationships:

  • “She loved him. She cared about him.” — Celeste Flores Narvaez, [33:48]
  • “The more we learned about their relationship. Very contentious, very volatile.” — Investigator, [39:43]

• On the investigation and confession:

  • “You could tell he was scared... He was playing the 'I don’t know what you’re talking about,'... but we had to have something to entice him with.” — Investigator, [49:24]
  • “Jason decides that we need to get rid of her car. And so Jason drove her car clear across town with Louie following him.” — Investigator, [52:37]

• On the Pain of Discovery:

  • “After almost a month missing, Debbie is finally found.” — Narrator, [62:21]
  • “And I was hoping that Debbie would call me one day and say, ‘You ready to rehearse?’ But I never got that call. All I have is memories of her.” — Investigator, [63:47]

• On Justice and Remorse:

  • “When the verdict came in and they said, guilty of murder of the second degree, it was a moment of justification that everything I did for her was for that moment.” — Celeste Flores Narvaez, [79:04]
  • “Killing somebody is not the way to resolve anything…I am sorry that this situation ended the way it did… I’m responsible for that. I should have been better.” — Jason Griffith (from prison), [85:01]

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Debbie’s Life & Vegas Career: [00:33-08:08]
• Disappearance & Immediate Aftermath: [06:08-09:00, 13:43-17:20]
• Toxic Relationship Dynamics: [29:08-41:22]
• Critical Investigative Breakthroughs: [45:05-54:03]
• Detailed Confession & Body Disposal: [54:03-62:14]
• Discovery & Arrest: [62:21-67:21]
• Trial: [69:07-79:04]
• Aftermath, Parole, and Legacy: [80:00-87:00]

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Emotional and Narrative Tone

• The episode maintains a somber, investigative, and empathetic tone—balancing the procedural details with moments of raw emotion and grief, especially from Debbie’s sister, Celeste.
• The speakers oscillate between factual, investigative language and candid, heartfelt expressions of pain, love, and frustration.

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Conclusion

"Death of a Showgirl" intricately weaves the story of Debbie Flores Narvaez: her ascent in the glitzy yet dangerous world of Las Vegas entertainment, the volatile relationships that shaped her demise, and the long, emotionally charged fight for justice. The episode stands out for its depth of personal interviews, compelling narrative, and nuanced exploration of the darker side of fame and ambition. Debbie’s spirit, as attested by her loved ones, continues to shine despite her tragic end.

Transcript

[Narrator]

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[Investigator]

Why am I doing shit I want to?

[Friend of Debbie]

A Vegas showgirl is a girl who has beauty, who has talent, who can be seductive.

You have so many women with their unique talents, and they're bringing them to this city.

[Investigator]

A Vegas showgirl is glamorous. She's beautiful. She's sexy. She is Las Vegas.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Debbie breathes dancing.

[Narrator/Investigator]

She landed a spot on one of the Strip's biggest shows, called Fantasy.

[Friend of Debbie]

Sometimes being pretty puts you at risk. I can tell you from personal experience how scary Vegas can be.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Debbie was never late to practice. She was always on time. But then the last practice before the opening act, Debbie didn't show up. Red flags immediately started popping off.

[Witness/Interviewee]

We have an employee that's been missing for about 24 hours now.

[Investigator]

We have to find her. Could she have been taken? Could she have been kidnapped?

[Interviewer/Investigator]

Everyone knows that she would not have missed the final dress rehearsal.

[Friend of Debbie]

This was her dream. And for her to not show up to rehearsal that day, it just wasn't right. It wasn't gonna turn out good.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

My name is Celeste Flores Narvaez. My sister's name is Deborah Flore. She loved dancing. It was her passion. She loved being in the spotlight. She loved performing, and she loved showcasing her ability and her creativity. Debbie decided that I'm going to pursue my dream of dancing and acting and modeling. And she moved to Las Vegas.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

Wow.

[Friend of Debbie]

Las Vegas is a city of lights and spectacle and major entertainment.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Debbie wanted to conquer the world. I remember right when she moved to Vegas, she was posting auditions, she was posting tryouts.

[Friend of Debbie]

She could do jazz, she could do hip hop, ballet. She was so graceful, but she had so much personality in her movement.

Debbie's ultimate goal in Las Vegas was just like the rest of us, to star in a big Las Vegas show.

[Investigator]

She wanted to learn ballroom theatrical arts and also a Vegas showgirl style. She looks good in her costume and a real tight bikini, a real sexy body. Sex sells in Las Vegas. If you're not sexy, you're not gonna get hired.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Debbie had that Vegas Showgirl quality and she was a hard worker. So in Debbie Landsite coveted role as a background dancer on Fantasy, it is a dream come true.

[Friend of Debbie]

When Debbie got a part in Fantasy at the looks door, she called all of us. She was so excited, she couldn't stop talking about it.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Fantas is an institution in Vegas. It's one of the strip's most popular burlesque shows. It's lasted decades and it features dance performances with top musical artists.

[Friend of Debbie]

I was so proud of her, so proud of her because she just felt as if she was now on the same playing field as many of us featured in major productions in Las Vegas.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Debbie's ambition doesn't stop at Fantasy. While she starts out as a background dancer, Debbie quickly earns her way to the front of the dance line

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

and

[Narrator/Investigator]

lands a solo alongside Grammy nominated artist Cisco.

[Friend of Debbie]

Debbie called and told me she was excited because she was going to be doing a show with Cisco.

And we all know Cisco is this dynamic entertainer. He's so talented, so popular. And his song the thong song was everywhere.

Let me see that thong, baby.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

The thong song was the biggest hit. Top 100.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Dancing as a soloist with the pop star Cisco is the biggest break of Debbie's career. Debbie and Cisco, shown here, practiced for weeks to perfect their routine.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

They practiced to make sure that they got the roll down. There's a part where I think he has to like smack her on her butt and he kind of like patted it and she was like, no, no, no, no, no. You gotta smack it. They had practice that day and then they took a break. Everyone went home. They were to reunite back that night so they can have a final practice before the red carpet opening.

[Investigator]

The final rehearsal is going to be at midnight. Very, very normal for a Las Vegas show.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

And Debbie didn't show up.

[Friend of Debbie]

I'm like, this is not right. It's not right at all. There's no way she's gonna give up her dream opportunity and not show up for rehearsals.

It was just so surprising. Cause Debbie is a very timely and professional person.

[Investigator]

Everybody was looking for her, all the dancers.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Debbie doesn't just miss midnight rehearsal. She can't be found. And when she doesn't show up to the premiere, the show has to replace her.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

I get a call from my mom and she says, hey, I'm worried I haven't heard from your sister and been trying to call her. I immediately called my sister and went straight to voicemail and I sent her a Facebook message and I said, hey, mom and dad are looking for you. Just please call Them back.

[Investigator]

As fantasy goes on without her, Debbie has not been heard from for 24 hours.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Nobody knew anything. I decided to call her roommate who then told me, I put a missing report out on your sister. I haven't heard from her. This is serious.

[Anonymous Witness]

Hi. I need to file a missing person real quick. And who is the person you need to file it on? My roommate. Okay.

[Witness/Interviewee]

How long has it been since you saw this person?

[Anonymous Witness]

48 hours Sunday night, right around like 7 o' clock the last time I saw her. And what is this person's name? Deborah. Deborah Flores. S L O R E S.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

I started getting anxious. I went on her Facebook and I put a message out saying, if anybody's heard from my sister, just let me know. Debbie without a phone or her social media was unheard of.

[Friend of Debbie]

She was so very active on social media. She had a Facebook account with social media, so many fans and she took pictures every night. And that was a dangerous thing to do because you're letting thousands of people know where you work.

It can be very, very, very dangerous. For many showgirls in Las Vegas, these women are exposing themselves physically to much of male audiences.

I was certain that someone had snatched her. One of her fans, maybe someone was rejected and decided to maybe seek revenge.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

She's a beautiful woman, she's a dancer. She's missing

[Narrator/Investigator]

surveillance footage of Debbie leaving her apartment, walking out into the Vegas night where she disappears without a trace.

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[Investigator]

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[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Throw those in there. I am making pollo guisado con arroji gandules, which is a Puerto Rican stew and it is very popular in Puerto Rico. Debbie was always extremely proud to be Latina. She loved a good chicken dish. Some of her favorites was pollo guisado arrocon habichuela arro con pollo which is rice and chicken arro con pollo. My sister was a terrible cook. There were times when she would try to make a meal for like her boyfriend. We were both born in Puerto Rico. My mom was a housemaker taking care of me and my sister and my father. He worked for the military and when we were seven and eight we moved to Maryland which was completely new to us. We were in a different world. We didn't speak English so it was like, oh, my God, two new girls, and they don't speak English. We want to know what they're like. My sister and I were really close. My mother always dressed us alike. We were only a year and four months apart, so we always had twin outfits on. She was just like a little ball of fun. She was just tiny, tiny, little, little Debbie. Everybody always called her Little Debbie. When we were little, we would always perform in front of my mom. I just remember doing these, like, Michael Jackson dances that we would practice in our room, and then we would go present these dances to my mom. She just loved it. I met Debbie in seventh grade. I think I fell in love with Debbie probably the moment I met her. Before you even see her, you're going to hear her voice. She has this very, very loud, raspy voice.

[Investigator]

Even the way she talked, it had this, like, accent. It had this, like, spiciness to it.

[Friend of Debbie]

Debbie really did love her friends. If I told her that I needed something for the. For anything, she was like, I got you.

Debbie always had a smile on her face, but she also had a very sexy look to her. She could really charm you with just a single look.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

When you look at her, you see this dark hair and these dark eyes, and she's beautiful. She is beautiful.

[Friend of Debbie]

Of course, as friends, we all talked about goals and things we want to do, and she said she wanted to be a dancer, but I think she didn't think that dancing would pay the bills, let's say. So she buckled down, did good in school, went to college, got her degree.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Debbie went to school for international business, and during that international business, she fell in love with law, and she took several classes.

[Friend of Debbie]

She was working at a very prominent firm in Baltimore downtown, and was doing very well. Very well. She had a nice condo. You know, things like that. All the things that you aspire. Except she wasn't fulfilled. That one thing I think was missing, that was the dancing. Dancing at night in a club is fun, but it didn't fulfill her.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

She would go to salsa classes, and while she was working, she also decided to try to audition for the Redskin cheerleaders and ended up as a Redskins ambassador.

[Investigator]

Debbie was hired as a cheerleader ambassador. That's a very important public face role, really. Just a brand ambassador for one of the league's leading franchises. It's a big role to fill.

[Friend of Debbie]

She loved being with other girls, you know, like, wearing the cheerleader outfit. Who doesn't love a good cheerleader skirt? She loved keeping the fans happy, you know, making them smile. People are cheering. You on and that's what she wanted.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

I couldn't believe it, but it let me know how much potential she had.

[Narrator/Investigator]

But still, this was not enough for Debbie.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

I remember her personally calling me one day and saying, hey, Celeste, I'm thinking about moving to Vegas. What do you think? I told her absolutely not.

[Friend of Debbie]

I was so upset with her. I'm like, you're going over there by yourself.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

My thought to Vegas was sin city. You don't know anybody out there. Your friends ain't there, your family's not there. Who is out there?

[Friend of Debbie]

Nobody wanted her.

[Investigator]

But Debbie would not be discouraged. She was gonna take a big risk. She was convinced she could do it. She was gonna head west and she was gonna go and follow her dreams to Las Vegas.

[Friend of Debbie]

I first met Debbie after our initial auditions for what was the Michael Jackson this is it release of his documentary film. What stood out to me about Debbie when we first met was how much she talked. She just had so much to say, so many questions to ask and so many ideas. When you're in a situation of creating a project like that, it's wise to keep your place. But Debbie was one to always just like jump in and say, why don't we do this this way?

Debbie's specific goal at that time was to be at the front of the dance line every time she had a big show. She was just so excited, so excited.

[Narrator/Investigator]

And then of course, Debbie's promoted to that feature role with Cisco. So for those that know her, when Debbie doesn't show up for the final rehearsal, they know something must be wrong.

[Friend of Debbie]

And the alarm started going off.

[Investigator]

She would have never not showed up. Or there's no other reason that she came to Vegas except to be at

[Friend of Debbie]

this point in time.

[Investigator]

Debbie's been missing now for 24 hours and the police are involved. After the roommate called 911.

[Anonymous Witness]

Hi, I need to find a missing person real quick. And what is this person's name? Deborah. Debbie Flores. S L O R E L so

[Investigator]

detectives go to the apartment to talk to Debbie's roommate to learn more about what happened the night Debbie disappeared.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

The roommate said she was going to visit her boyfriend and then was going to work. But she never showed up to work.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Detectives then obtain the surveillance video from the apartment complex and it shows Debbie leaving her apartment just before 6pm the

[Interviewer/Investigator]

security footage shows Debbie dressed nicely and she's walking down the hallway and gets into the elevator in her apartment complex.

[Investigator]

She was wearing knee high boots, dark colored clothing. She carried a bag with her. In my opinion, it was going to be her dance clothes to go to the rehearsal late at night.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

Further on, there's footage of her vehicle driving out of the parking area.

[Investigator]

If Debbie was planning to stop by her boyfriend's place on the way to this final rehearsal, detectives are going to have to go find that boyfriend and find out what he knows.

[Friend of Debbie]

Me, personally, I'm thinking Debbie must have needed a break. She probably just left. Didn't want to tell anybody. Parents haven't talked to her either. Nobody in Vegas has talked to her either. Well, nobody in Baltimore has talked to her either.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Christmas holidays, I should be thinking about my son's gifts and Christmas and family and. No. On my mother's birthday, I flew out there. My main focus was to find where my sister was. I didn't care who, what, when, where. I just wanted to find her alive. I was out there night and day from the moment I woke up in the morning. I was constantly driving around. I was putting her face out there, Setting up volunteer groups to pass out flyers. Anytime that I would go outside, I would see the desert, and I'm like, could she be out there somewhere?

[Investigator]

Look, this is Vegas. What's the old slogan they were using that goes in Vegas, stays in vegas or something like that? Since Vegas was invented, it was a place that people disappear to. And it's, you know, by extension, a place that people disappear from. And it doesn't mean that a crime's

been committed Again, she could have just left. There could have been some issue. We don't know. The media is all over this. There's pressure from every direction.

[Friend of Debbie]

Debbie's disappearance attracted so much media attention on the news. Nancy Grace, what happened to Debbie Flores?

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

She doesn't show up for rehearsals. She doesn't show up for a show.

[Friend of Debbie]

Seeing Celeste crying and begging for her little sister's return was so hurtful.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

There's no hope or prayer.

[Investigator]

She is hope.

[Friend of Debbie]

She was everybody's sister, everybody's friend. She couldn't have an enemy. So absolutely, let's find this girl.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Detectives learn from Debbie's roommate that she left her apartment prior to her final rehearsal for her show to visit her boyfriend. He was another successful Vegas performer, Jason griffith, who was also called Blue Griffith.

[Friend of Debbie]

So when you become an artist, you have a nickname as you evolve as an artist in the entertainment industry. And so Jason blue griffith is known as Blue.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

I learned that Jason was a very skilled and trained and professional dancer. I learned that they were dating, and they were dating for a while.

[Friend of Debbie]

He danced with Toni Braxton, and he was in cirque du Soleil Love. And, you know, these are like major shows in Las Vegas.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

So the missing persons detectives contacted Jason Griffiths.

[Investigator]

Well, we went to the house where Jason and another man by the name of Louie were living.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

Jason said Debbie was there, but he said that she never exited her vehicle, that he only spoke to her through the open window on the driver's side of the the vehicle. She was only in the driveway for a few minutes and then left.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Police also learned from Jason that he had many on again, off again girlfriends and Debbie was just one of them. After detectives speak with Jason, they find that he's cooperative and not particularly suspicious.

[Investigator]

Other than that, detectives have very little to go on until Debbie's car is spotted.

Across town, police found her car, a 1997 Chevy Prism. A nearby resident said it sat for several days.

[Anonymous Witness]

It's awful that it has happened and I just wish that somebody, you know,

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

could have found her or something.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

The interesting thing about her car, it was kind of hidden in the backyard of an abandoned house, so it couldn't be seen from the street. But a neighbor had realized that it shouldn't have been there and called it in.

[Investigator]

I noticed that there was a maroon

[Anonymous Witness]

car parked over there. Grabbed my binoculars and I went out. So I looked through the binoculars and I wrote down the license plate number.

[Investigator]

First thing I noticed that it said Maryland.

[Anonymous Witness]

I called Tuesday morning. I noticed that the license plate was missing Wednesday morning. So sometime between Tuesday night and Wednesday

[Investigator]

morning, somebody come and took the plate.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

When officers in that area of town recovered the car, they found clothing in the backseat that matched the clothing on the video that she had been wearing. They found the boots that she was wearing when she left her apartment the night that she went missing.

[Friend of Debbie]

When the police found her car, it was very upsetting. She would never leave her purse, her dance bag, you know, those types of things in the car. She's a girl, you know, I gotta have lipstick. I gotta have my. Whatever you need.

That was a shock for me. I had been in that car many, many times with Deb and with her belongings in it and everything. That, to me was that just indicated that this was. This wasn't going to be good. It wasn't going to turn out good.

[Investigator]

They searched the car, they searched the trunk. The properties around it were searched. We looked for video. Nothing. There was no forced entry into the car. There was no blood in the car. Except for the plate being removed and put inside the trunk, there wasn't much.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

That discovery of Debbie's car was a critical piece of information in this investigation. And it also started steering the investigation towards a homicide rather than just a straight up missing person case.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

My parents are in distress. They're anxious, they're worried, but they're hopeful. There were times where they kind of gave up and thinking that she had already passed, and I wouldn't allow that.

[Investigator]

So the days pass. There's no body. There's no obvious crime scene. It's as if Debbie just up and vanished into thin air. So detectives hold a news conference, and they want to encourage the public to come forward. Has anybody seen her, heard from her, anything that they could go on that might be a lead?

Good morning. Thank you for attending this press conference this morning to discuss the disappearance of Deborah. We believe that Deborah was last seen on Sunday, December 12. If anyone has any information regarding the disappearance of Deborah that they please contact the police department through Crime Stoppers.

[Narrator/Investigator]

While detectives wait for tips to come in, they decide to pay Jason Griffith another visit.

[Investigator]

All we really knew at this point was he was the last one person reportedly to have seen her alive. During the interview with Jason, he did indicate that he knew that there was a domestic violence case where Debbie hadn't been beaten.

[Narrator/Investigator]

And Jason suggests to police that if anyone had a reason to hurt Debbie, it might be her former boyfriend.

[Investigator]

I mean, I could.

[Anonymous Witness]

I could make. I could make that assessment that, like,

[Investigator]

you know, this is somebody that hurt her.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

I think it's a horrible feeling when you don't know where your loved one is and you don't have no answers, because the longer you're out there looking for her, the more you're thinking of possibilities and you just keep going and going and going. Could she be out there somewhere?

[Investigator]

What we know is on December 14, a missing persons report was filed by Deborah's roommate stating that she had not seen Deborah for a couple of days.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Investigators are looking at Debbie's romantic relationships to unearth any clues that might help them figure out where she is, including Jason Blue Griffith.

[Investigator]

Jason Griffith was Debbie's last known boyfriend. When she disappears, and he is completely willing to cooperate with the investigation.

All we really knew at this point was he was the last person reportedly to have seen her alive. They have surveillance video of her leaving her apartment alone in her geoprism. And she tells everybody she's going to Jason's house and they're going to watch Dexterity. It's a TV show, and that's the last time anybody sees her.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

We're never hopeful to discover someone dead, but at this point, we have a firm belief that Debbie is, in fact Dead, not just missing. We have some inconsistencies in how she was last seen. That is Jason Griffith's house. We have her car hidden on a different area of town from where she went missing and where she's last seen. So at this point, we're suspecting foul play.

[Investigator]

The reason we're here is Deborah, a very close friend of yours, has gone missing. And from all accounts that we have, at this point, you're the last person to have seen her. Is it correct, as far as you know?

Yes, as far as I know.

We all sat down and we did a rather lengthy interview of Jason Griffith. She's standing at your door. You answer the door, you say, oh, you're there. What is she wearing? As much as you can remember. It'd be extremely helpful for us.

Hair was down, wearing black.

Okay, Some kind of a black shirt,

[Anonymous Witness]

some kind of a black top with

[Investigator]

everything else was black.

[Anonymous Witness]

There was nothing that stood out.

[Investigator]

So I was like, everything you say to us is going to be extremely important to us. And I let him talk as much as he wanted to talk. There was no confrontation of any kind, and we just gathered information.

Jason tells detectives that Debbie left his apartment that night and he never saw her again.

During the interview with Jason, he did indicate that he knew that there was a domestic violence case where Debbie had been beaten.

It was hard for her because she had went through an abusive relationship.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Jason brings up a situation from over a year prior between Debbie and one of her ex boyfriends named Jamil McGhee.

[Anonymous Witness]

I was just told that he had

[Investigator]

beat her up, so there was a

lawsuit that was going on. We can't overlook anything. You have to run everything down.

She said that she was, you know, beat up, bruised and stuff like that. And then she had told me that she had a case coming up.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

So Debbie and Jamil, they met in Baltimore, and they dated for a while, and he was on the show so youo Think youk Can Dance.

[Investigator]

I'm just gonna show the world what I got.

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

You know what I'm saying?

[Narrator/Investigator]

They both decide to move across the country to Las Vegas in search of achieving their dancing dreams. But it isn't as romantic as it seems.

[Prosecutor]

They had a relationship that at times was slightly tumultuous.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Debbie liked broken Birds. As I would say, when she saw something wrong with someone, she always tried to do the most in trying to fix people.

[Investigator]

Was she afraid I could make that

[Anonymous Witness]

assessment that, like, you know, this is somebody that hurt her to somebody she

[Investigator]

would be afraid of.

According to family and friends, the Relationship

[Friend of Debbie]

was a concern, and I remember her getting, like, just crazy calls from him. And I would go to her apartment and stay with her, and I would just, like, be there just to stay with her, just so a guy can be there with her.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

There was an allegation of abuse on his part, and he put his hands on my sister, and she took him to court.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Debbie was granted a judgment of $250,000. In a suit, she claims that Jameel committed battery against her, leaving physical scarring that limited modeling and dance work that she would have been able to be hired for. Jameel denied those claims in court.

[Friend of Debbie]

He had really messed up things with her career, because the things that she was doing, you know, she wouldn't be able to do anymore. That's what she thought.

[Investigator]

But Debbie had healed enough to be back on stage. Those close to Debbie say she was planning to collect on that $250,000 judgment before she went missing.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Wait a minute. That's $250,000. People have gone missing, have gotten hurt for less than that. That, to me, is a huge flag.

[Investigator]

Detectives did look at him. He alibi'd. He was not in Las Vegas at the time, but he was fully investigated.

Jameel is completely cleared. So investigators decide to circle back and take another look at Jason. He was her most recent love interest. Who is Jason Blue Griffith?

[Interviewer/Investigator]

Debbie seemed to be attracted to Jason, and only Jason or Jason was attracted to all pretty girls.

[Narrator/Investigator]

But if Debbie wanted a monogamous relationship, Jason was not the guy for that.

[Investigator]

I mean, at one point, he told me he had some six or seven girlfriends going at the same time. And his excuse for this was, this is Vegas, baby.

[Friend of Debbie]

Jason. Jason Blue Griffith. Everyone loved him. He was very well respected in the dance community.

People had nothing but great things to say about him as a person, as an artist.

Debbie called me, and she said, I met this guy. He's a dancer like me.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

What drew the two of them together initially was the fact that they were both dancers in top physical shape, good at what they did, and they were both fairly attractive.

[Friend of Debbie]

Not many people understand being an entertainer and using your body to express yourself creatively in a passionate way. And both Blu and Debbie express themselves in that way. When it came to Blue, Debbie really loved his passion and how talented he was, how much fun they would have together, how much they laughed, their inside jokes. She felt like they were soulmates.

[Investigator]

The problem here was that while Debbie may have felt that she and Jason were soulmates, Jason was playing the field.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

Debbie seemed to be attracted to Jason and only Jason. Jason was attracted to all pretty girls.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

I learned that he was a playboy. He had several girlfriends.

[Friend of Debbie]

Debbie did want her relationship with Blue to be exclusive.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

There were rumors that there was another girl or there was others and she was being cheated on and Debbie didn't like that. She loved them. She cared about him.

[Investigator]

He told me he had six or seven girlfriends going at the same time. And his excuse for this was, this is Vegas, baby.

[Narrator/Investigator]

One of those many girlfriends is Agnes Rue, an aerialist at a show called Zoomanity. And she seems to have captured Jason's heart.

[Friend of Debbie]

She was French. Such a sweetheart. I remember her. And I did a couple industrial gigs together in Las Vegas, and I just loved her. Very talented.

[Anonymous Witness]

It.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

You do want to look at Anya to see if maybe she could be involved in Debbie's disappearance or even if she can just provide information. I wanted to start off by asking about your relationship with Jason Griffith, who you know as Blue Blu. Okay. And how has your relationship with. With Blue progressed? How has it been recently? Recently in the last couple of months?

[Witness/Interviewee]

Ah, okay. No, because I was very, very happy with him for the first six months when I discovered that he, in fact, kept three other. At least three other girls at the same time as me. One is Debbie Flores Narvaez.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Debbie learns about Agnes and Jason dating, and she calls her.

[Witness/Interviewee]

Debbie has always kind of been in contact with me since the first three weeks we started dating.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

Agnes did receive a phone call from Debbie where Debbie is warning her about being involved in a relationship with Jason.

[Witness/Interviewee]

She was warning me because she had been hearing from comic friends that I was a great girl and. And she was like, warning me not to do the same mistake she did.

[Investigator]

It seems that Debbie wants Agnes to know who Jason really was. In her mind, he was a serial dater.

Certainly Debbie was not okay with Jason seeing any other women. She was aware of them. She was aware of Agnes, and Agnes was aware of Debbie, and there was conflict in their relationship on both relationships because of the other woman. They weren't okay with it, but apparently that's how Jason wanted to live his life. And if they wanted to to be with him, they were going to have to deal with it at some point.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

Anya's had enough of Debbie and the volatility of that particular relationship, and so she had broken things off with Jason.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Agnes and Jason get back together just in time to celebrate Jason's birthday on December 10, the same weekend Debbie goes missing. They spend parts of the weekend together at a hotel.

[Witness/Interviewee]

We slept at a hotel called Rumer. We wanted to do something different for his birthday. He's not partying or he's not going out to club and stuff. So we went to eat, and we went to sleep at Rumer.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

What did he say about Debbie that night?

[Witness/Interviewee]

Well, that night, he was saying that he explained her for real, that not even to be friends is cool. He's telling me that. That he explained her and that she understood.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

And then. Did you have any contact from Debbie after that?

[Witness/Interviewee]

No.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Detectives quickly determined that Agnes is not a suspect.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

She was pretty much cleared as being a person of interest or, you know, possibly being a suspect.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Police are stuck at this point. They have no solid leads. And then just before calling Christmas, they receive a call from the Arizona State Police.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

Metro received notification that there had been a burned body found over the state line just past the Hoover Dam on the Arizona side of the river.

[Investigator]

A female with long, dark hair with a very thin build, which matched the description of Debbie Flores.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

The body had been just dumped in the middle of nowhere, just off the highway and doused with the flammable liquid and set on fire.

[Investigator]

A gruesome discovery today investigating a possible connection between the missing dancer and a

[Anonymous Witness]

body found out at Hoover Dam.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

We heard that they found the body in Arizona. I was scared.

[Friend of Debbie]

A source close to News 3 saying it's likely the body belongs to missing dancer Debbie Flores Narvaez.

Everyone was on pins and needles to find out if this was Debbie or not.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

At this point, we're suspecting foul play. This is going to be Debbie.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Every second is agonizing.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

The body is brought back to Las Vegas. Clark County Coroner's Office.

[Investigator]

At autopsy, I learned that it was not Debbie.

[Friend of Debbie]

When it was confirmed that it was not Debbie, it kind of gave people a sigh of relief.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

There was a glimmer of hope that my sister's still out there. She's alive.

[Investigator]

We have to find her.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Yes. You want to go there?

[Anonymous Witness]

Yes.

[Investigator]

You want to go there?

[Narrator/Investigator]

What investigators are learning is that as a couple, Debbie Flores Narvaez and Jason Griffith may have brought out the very best and also the very worst in each other.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

We learned that Jason and Debbie's relationship was toxic.

[Investigator]

The more we learned about their relationship. Very contentious, very volatile.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

I don't give a. I know legally the law, and I know what is legally wrong.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

And he recorded her unbeknownst to her, and he questioned her.

[Investigator]

He videotaped her confession. Yeah, I slashed her tires. I mean, he got the whole thing on tape. My tires is not illegal. Slashing my tires is not legally.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

It is Damage to property that no one witnessed.

[Investigator]

But I knew that when you came out.

[Anonymous Witness]

I am.

[Investigator]

So you're admitting to property damage? Yeah.

[Narrator]

Debbie and Jason had a very fiery relationship. They were either on or they were very much off.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Debbie's friend Bethany suspects that the tension exists between Debbie and Jason because they have different expectations of the relationship. She wants monogamy and is exacting revenge on her cheating boyfriend.

[Friend of Debbie]

Debbie for sure wanted a serious monogamous relationship. Debbie was not the type of woman that was not going to agree to just be someone's side piece

[Investigator]

throughout their relationship. Both Jason And Debbie call 911 on each other.

[Witness/Interviewee]

911 emergency.

[Anonymous Witness]

I have a domestic problem. My girlfriend will not leave my house. She just locked me out of one of my rooms. She doesn't live there? Nope, doesn't live here.

[Narrator/Investigator]

And then just a week later, another 911 call from Jason.

[Anonymous Witness]

I just need a squat car, please. Okay. What's going on? My girlfriend just came to the house and punched out my window, and she needs to go. What do you use her fist? Does she need an itchy bleeding? Mom, she's bleeding, but that's her responsibility. I'm more so worried about the window. Okay.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

It's unusual in the moment that you would make that reaction when you're reporting that someone is hurt. But I do know that ultimately, Debbie did a lot of damage to Jason's property. His calls to the police paint Debbie as someone who's emotional, unstable, that possibly wants to do harm to herself because the relationship isn't going the way that she wants. Now, on the other side, you have Debbie's accusations where Jason is unfaithful, Jason is violent. You know, Jason is somebody to be feared.

[Investigator]

And you can hear in the background of this call, Debbie is clearly upset.

[Witness/Interviewee]

And.

[Anonymous Witness]

What's her name? Her name is Debbie. And her last name? DiCaprio. Okay. What's her last name? What's your. I can't hear you. What's her last name? It never matter if your roommates are there or not, because I'm gonna go against you. I have no. You are a coward. Excuse me? You are a coward. Can you hear me? No, I can't. What's. What's her last name? Her name is Debbie Flores.

[Narrator/Investigator]

In that video that Jason secretly records of Debbie. The confessions continue.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

I. Nope. I couldn't take it.

[Investigator]

I slapped you, okay. Oh, so you now you assaulted.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

This was after a huge fight they had. He was caught cheating, lying, manipulating, and gaslighting her. So you're.

[Sponsor/Advertisement Voice]

You're admitting that you Assaulted me.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

I'm admitting that I hate you. Did I work in your house? That I looked at your laptop? That I poured egg whites on your car? That I slashed three of your tires because I said, I'll give him one left. I am not going to lie about anything I'm doing.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

And it was the weirdest thing to see her admitting, yes, I slashed your tires and I did only three of the four on purpose. I don't know why someone would do that, but it made perfect sense to her at the time.

[Friend of Debbie]

I learned this from Debbie. If you want to really get under someone's skin instead of slashing all four tires, slash, slash three, you have to buy your tires and sets.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

But I did it.

[Sponsor/Advertisement Voice]

You do this.

[Investigator]

Cuz I think I can't prove it.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

You think when I'm slashing tires, I'm like, oh. He's like, no. Do you think I have to actually

[Investigator]

tell you I'm slash tires?

[Anonymous Witness]

No. You.

[Investigator]

You knew it was going to be

[Anonymous Witness]

me when you walked, but you.

[Investigator]

But you basically sash the tires.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Is this you? If you think you can with me

[Investigator]

and hurt with me, but you, but you. You. You do it and you make sure that there's no proof that you did it. So I can't do any. Take any legal action.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

There's going to be a breaking point. And she reached that breaking point where she slashed his tires because she's had enough. And they broke up.

[Investigator]

They had broken things off completely for several months and didn't have any contact with each other.

In October, just two months before Debbie's disappearance, she and Jason get into another fight.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

She was in his face. He grabbed her and threw her down, and he ended up pulling some of her hair out. So at that point, she had contacted the police and he was arrested for domestic violence. When Jason was arrested, she had got a restraining order against him. And even though he wasn't supposed to be anywhere near her, she would come to his house to watch tv.

[Narrator/Investigator]

It's been almost a month since Debbie's disappearance. Police don't have a body. They don't have a crime scene. They don't even have proof that Debbie's been harmed until they receive a tip about a woman who has information vital to solving the case.

[Investigator]

When we were talking to her, and that was my first thought is why didn't you tell somebody about this?

[Witness/Interviewee]

I'm scared. Making a statement to you.

[Narrator/Investigator]

And what she tells detectives is bone

[Witness/Interviewee]

chilling because obviously if Blue can do that to her, he could do it to me.

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[Investigator]

Love Overboard is now streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney.

[Friend of Debbie]

Sixteen singles are headed to this super luxury yacht to fall in love.

[Investigator]

I'm a romantic.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

I want to find love. This is going to be the best

[Witness/Interviewee]

summer of our lives.

[Friend of Debbie]

But whoever you do not choose will be going overboard.

[Witness/Interviewee]

This is insane.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

Let the games begin.

[Investigator]

Watch the new Hulu original series Love Overboard, now streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney plus for bundle subscribers. Terms apply.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Four weeks after Debbie's disappearance, Las Vegas detectives tracked down a former girlfriend of Jason Griffith in a suburb outside of Vegas, and Kalei Casorso reveals information that will break the case wide open.

[Investigator]

We tracked her down at her place of work and got an interview from her.

[Witness/Interviewee]

I'm just nervous. I'm scared.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

She wanted to remain anonymous, which tells me that she has information that she wants to put out there, but she wants to protect herself as well.

[Witness/Interviewee]

I'm scared making a statement to you because obviously if Blue can do that to her, he could do it to me. They know where I live.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

She has been involved in a relationship with Jason, so she knows how he is.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Clay explains that she is Terrified because she believes that Jason killed Debbie and that someone else may be involved.

[Witness/Interviewee]

Him and his roommate.

[Investigator]

Which roommate we talking about, Louie?

[Witness/Interviewee]

Yeah, the big Puerto Rican guy.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Luis Colombo was Jason's roommate. Jason was popular, would have a lot of women. Louis Colombo was complete opposite, but he really cared about Jason. They were best friends, and he was willing to pretty much do anything that Jason asked him to do.

[Investigator]

It was imperative to us find Louis Colombo. That was our goal. I talked to Daniel Kelly.

[Narrator]

It cannot be overstated how important Louie's interview was to ultimately finding Debbie. There was just an avalanche of information that Louie gave to the police, helped give Debbie's family some well deserved answers.

[Investigator]

Now you have the opportunity to do the right thing and have that girl's family know what happened and at least have that. That close, that closure. You could tell he was scared, but he was playing the, you know, I don't know what you're talking about. You know, I don't get it. I don't know why I'm here.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

Louis Colombo did not want to be involved in the investigation at all. So what do you want?

[Investigator]

Tell us what you want right now.

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

I just don't want to be involved.

[Investigator]

Oh, it's too. What he's trying to tell you is

it's too late for that.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

We knew he was going to be the weak link, but we had to have something to entice him with. And. And the deal was, was the enticement.

[Investigator]

We made the decision. We're going to tell him. We're not going to arrest him. I can guarantee this. You tell us what happened and you're not getting arrested. That's my guarantee to you.

I don't know if he would ever talked if we didn't give him the deal.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

No, I don't want to say you're making a deal with the devil, but we wanted the information that he had.

[Investigator]

We know you wish you could rewind it, but you can't. Now you got to go forward and you need to tell us what happened from the beginning all the way to the end. Lewis, did you kill Debbie?

[Narrator/Investigator]

No.

[Investigator]

Then talk to him.

You need to tell us what happened. Early on in the interview, it was obvious that he 100% knew what had taken place.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

Debbie showed up to the house. There was an argument.

[Investigator]

Just walk us through. What? What were they arguing about?

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

I don't know. They were just arguing. They're just yelling at each other.

[Investigator]

Okay.

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

You know, they're pushing, shoving, you know, he grabbed her, she grabbed him. I split them apart. I saw him choke Him.

[Investigator]

During the argument.

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

During the argument. And I pulled him off of her. That's why I got her some water. And I asked him if they were going to be all right. Try to tell her no more arguing, no more fighting.

[Investigator]

Like, she's still breathing, she's still talking.

All right. What'd she say to you?

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

She said that she was all right.

[Prosecutor]

He's worried, and he asks both of them, can I leave you two here alone and can you two be civil with each other? And they both say, yes.

[Investigator]

Columbus says he leaves the house for about two hours.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

When he came home, he saw Debbie laying on the floor with a plastic bag over her head, and she was not moving and did not appear to be breathing.

[Investigator]

What did he say?

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

He was like.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

Like.

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

Like, what are you talking about? And then we walked to the studio, and I saw, like, I was in shock, you know, I was shaking. He was like, you know, this is one of those diaper change moments.

[Investigator]

Jason said something to Louie about this being a change your diaper moment. So we had him explain that was a change your diaper moment. You know, hey, when I raised you, I used to change your diapers. And now it's payback time. You know, I took care of you. Now it's time to take care of me.

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

He's done a lot for me, like favors and stuff, like, financially and stuff. Okay, so he was like, you know, this is one of those moments.

[Prosecutor]

He was very specific about what happened afterwards. He said they had a big bin that they wind up putting her in there.

[Investigator]

You helped put her in the bin?

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

Yeah.

[Investigator]

Was she cold?

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

Was she? Yeah, she was.

[Investigator]

You know, Debbie had driven her car over to the house to watch Dexter. And so Jason decides that we need to get rid of her car. And so Jason drove her car clear across town with Louie following him. Just parked her car there in this little desert dirt lot kind of area. And then Jason gets in the car with Louie and they drive back to the house.

[Narrator/Investigator]

That night. Columbo goes to his job as a bouncer at a club.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Jason had a date that night. He and Luis Colombo placed my sister in the garage. Jason went out that night with Andy to celebrate his birthday. They had a hotel room. He stayed the night. They had a good night as if nothing happened, while my sister laid dead with a bag over her head in his garage.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Colombo says that in place the first. The following days, Jason Griffith devises a plan to entomb Debbie's body in a block of concrete.

[Prosecutor]

And then Jason winds up going to Home Depot and getting A bunch of cement.

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

His idea was to put it on concrete. So, you know, tells me to stop mixing the concrete. I started mixing the concrete. Where do we turn? The garage.

[Anonymous Witness]

Okay.

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

You know, put her in the bin. Put the concrete in it.

[Investigator]

How was she positioned in the bin?

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

Like, sort of curled up. Like, it was a awkward shape.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

It's your typical blue sterilite storage container. So when you put a 120 pound body in there and then fill the rest up with concrete, obviously it's heavy.

[Investigator]

It weighed, at the minimum, 600 pounds. How long do you let it sit?

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

Till the next day.

[Anonymous Witness]

Okay.

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

I think that's when we rented the U Haul.

[Investigator]

We rented the U Haul. And what else?

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

A dolly and a hamstruck.

[Investigator]

They rent the U Haul and then Jason comes with a plan. They then drive it out to Jason's ex in Henderson.

[Witness/Interviewee]

He had called and asked me if I would store some stuff for him. I said, all right, you know, what is it? He's like, it's just a tub.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

She sees a U Haul truck, and she looks inside, and she sees Louie and Jason trying to manhandle this big blue sterilite storage tub.

[Witness/Interviewee]

So I'm like, whoa, what is that? Because I kind of got a bad feeling. And he just gave me this look, like, do you want me to tell you? And I was like, yeah, you think you're storing that at my house? You're gonna tell me what it is? And he was like, it's Debbie. And I was like, whoa, that's. No, you need to go right now. And I was very upset.

[Investigator]

So once they leave Calais, they have to do something immediate. What they did was found this house that they knew was abandoned on Bonanza Way.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

The body has been in this container now for a few days, and it's starting to decompose. And now you have all this decomposition fluid starts leaking out of the crack in this tub.

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

Yeah, so it leaked out. I guess it leaked out a little bit.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

And there's a trail of it from the sidewalk all the way up to the front door and inside the house.

[Investigator]

And then Jason came up with plan B. And they bought more bins, they bought more cement. They bought a. Like a mini sledgehammer.

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

So we basically, like, broke it out of the concrete body.

[Investigator]

Okay, so you actually break up the cement. Break up the cement and take her out. What does she look like? Louis tells us that he can take us to where the body is.

Like, an abandoned house.

Now the big question is, where's the

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

house on Bonaventure Take us To it.

[Investigator]

You don't have to go in, but can you take us to the house?

We gotta go.

We've gotta get it.

Luis Colombo leads detectives to a vacant house, and what they find inside takes this case from missing to monstrous.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Jason Griffith and Louis Colombo's problems are mallow. The bin they have Debbie in is cracked, and it's leaking all over the wood floors in the living room of a vacant house.

[Investigator]

They came up with a plan. They bought more bins. They bought more cement gloves, bleach sealant, plastic bags, garbage bags. They bought a wood saw, a mini sledgehammer to chipper out of the cement, and a crowbar. Louise says that they chipped her out of the cement, and then Jason dismembered her by cutting her legs off, had

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

her go into two separate bins and cut her legs off. Well, she cut her legs off.

[Investigator]

He did.

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

Okay.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

With what? A saw.

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

Okay. Then put it in plastic bags, and I put it in the bin and put more concrete on it.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

Okay.

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

You know, put it in the closet.

[Investigator]

They put the legs in one bin and then her upper body in the other bin and put cement in with those.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

Then they take all the tools that they used and put in the closet of the other bedroom and seal that closet door closed as well. But they leave all the cleaning agents and odor masking agents that they had to buy so that they could work with the body. They leave that all out in plain view in the living room.

[Investigator]

So you stored her in the closet

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

and let it set in the closet. Then he asked me to go back a couple days later just to check on it. So I bought some. Some great stuff, like door sealant. Because it's in the closet. I didn't want it smelling, so I sealed the door. Like, that was.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Takes a lot of coaxing for Luis Colombo to reveal what happened. And police tell him that because he cooperated, he won't be criminally charged. And while that's a relief, he is haunted.

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

That doesn't change how responsible I feel. Like, you could say, oh, you don't have to feel responsible. It doesn't change the things that I've done that I have to live with for the rest of my life. It doesn't change any of that. It doesn't change, you know, the sleepless nights that I'm gonna have.

[Investigator]

Yes.

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

The smell that I still smell. It doesn't change any of that. Like, now. Only thing that changes is Jay goes to jail, possibly for the rest of his life. And, like, now I feel like that's my Fault, too.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

He admits to his involvement to the detectives and he admits that he knows where the body's at. So he ultimately takes two of our detectives to the location of the body.

[Investigator]

They have a house where they, they can put her body and it's not going to be connected to them.

Supposedly they knew somebody that had this house that had been deported and that the house was empty.

After the interview with Louis, he jumped into my truck and we had a caravan going. He was directing me and he pointed out the house and he said, 100% she's in there. So we're pulling into the neighborhood. This is Bonanza Way. This is where the house is. And we pulled up and Louie told me that's the house where her body will be. This house right here,

[Interviewer/Investigator]

It's one of the original houses built downtown probably back in the 30s or 40s. It's just this tiny two bedroom house, but it had wood flooring throughout.

[Investigator]

When we got here, they opened the door. There was an odor of decomp, but it was mixed with chemical. You could literally smell it from my vehicle. You could smell bleach and other chemicals. And they noticed that there was decon drips on the walkway itself. I walked in. There was the original bin, which was this gigantic bin that they had about 600 pounds of cement in with her that you couldn't lift. That was in the living room. First thing I saw was the long black hair. You could see her hair mixed in with the cement because it removed all the hair from her body. There was chunks of cement that were in the bin and some plastic. The two smaller green 45 gallon bins were stacked inside of one of the closets which had been sealed. And they had taken them out and got them open enough to where they found the body. She had been dismembered in two parts and put in the two bins with cement and plastic, thinking that would help with the odor, but it. It never does.

They literally did the whole Dexter thing.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

If you know anything about Dexter, the way he disposed of bodies was dismembering them.

[Investigator]

It's kind of fitting, don't you think?

[Interviewer/Investigator]

And that was Jason's favorite TV show.

[Narrator/Investigator]

After almost a month missing, Debbie is finally found

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

January 7th. I was in a car with my friend at the time. She had taken me out to kind of relax a little bit. And I get a call on my phone and it says, private number. And I knew right away. I answered and he said, this is detective. And I said, you found her? Said you found her. I knew it was I knew it was that phone call.

[Friend of Debbie]

One of my friends called and said, you know, they found Debbie. And I'm thinking, good.

[Investigator]

Where the hell has she been?

[Friend of Debbie]

She's like, she's not here with us anymore.

[Investigator]

Okay.

[Friend of Debbie]

What does that even mean? And she said, yeah, like, they found her body, and they definitely confirmed that it's her. Somebody with such a big personality, you don't picture things like that happening to them. I did not fathom that that was where it was going to go.

[Investigator]

When I found out what happened to her, I couldn't sleep. It was all over the news. 24.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

7, the remains of a missing local dancer have been discovered.

[Investigator]

Sources have confirmed that the body of that missing dancer, Debbie Flores Narvaez, was found dismembered in tubs filled with concrete. I can't believe. This has got to be a bad dream. And I was hoping that Debbie would call me one day and say, you ready to rehearse? But I never got that call. All I have is memories of her.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

You have someone who dances for a living. Their job depends on their beauty, their athleticism, their gracefulness. And to have a body just destroyed in the manner that her body was destroyed, it's a cruel irony. It's horrible.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Detectives now have Debbie's body, and with the evidence pointing firmly to Jason, it's time to quickly move in. As Jason finishes his evening performance, detectives haul him back the station for another chat

[Interviewer/Investigator]

will be. January 8, 2011, at 0008 hours.

[Investigator]

We're here to ask you some more questions about what happened to Debbie.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

January 8, 2011 at 00:08 hours.

[Investigator]

We're here to ask you some more questions about what happened to Debbie.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

At this point, we knew where the body was. We knew his involvement.

[Investigator]

We didn't say. Kalei told us these things, and we didn't go. Louie mapped all this out, you know, told us all these things because we were gonna parse those details out and get his reaction to them. Without much further ado, I'd like for you to tell me what happened to her. What do you mean, what happened to her? I've given my. Like, what. What I saw. What was that? That she came to my house and that she left.

[Anonymous Witness]

I gave that account already.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

When you're dealing with somebody who thinks they're smarter than everybody else, you have to play them a little bit. You got to give them enough rope to run with, with before you can yank them back to reality.

[Investigator]

On that night, when she came over, there was an argument and became physical. And ultimately she didn't live through it.

[Narrator/Investigator]

And this is.

[Investigator]

You guys are putting this together based on a lot of things, but that she didn't live through it.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

If you come in mean, angry or heavy handed, they're not going to cooperate with you. They're going to down shut, shut down. And the ultimate goal is to elicit a confession.

[Investigator]

We're in a situation where if, if, when confronted with some things that you, you end up saying, okay, all right, look, okay, look, this is what happened. It went too far. It was, it, I don't know, it was an accident. I, I didn't realize what happened and then I panicked. I see what you guys are saying in my. We're just at a point like, what are you reaching for right now? I'm not reaching for anything other than the truth.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

And now the interview becomes an interrogation and everything changes in the interview. And now you start hitting them with facts and you ask them direct questions.

[Investigator]

Did you kill Debbie? No, I didn't kill Debbie. Not on purpose or on accident? Not on purpose or not on accident? You didn't strangle her to the point where she stopped breathing?

No.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

There came a point in the interview where Jason decided, decided that he wanted his lawyer present before answering any other questions.

[Investigator]

You guys are gonna do your jobs. You're gonna do what you're supposed to do. I don't have anything else. And so we shut it down. He was placed under arrest. You are under arrest for Debbie's murder.

[Prosecutor]

At the end of the interview, he was taken into custody, booked into the Clark County Detention Center.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Four days later, Jason was charged with Debbie's murder. However, he was not charged with dismembering her body.

[Investigator]

Morning, judge. We received a copy of the indictment

with wave its formal reading.

It's going to be a not guilty plea.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

I was scared to go to the arraignment. I. I didn't know what I was going to face. But I was sitting there and I'm looking at this evil person and I was trying to control myself and I just couldn't. To the point where I just couldn't. And I screamed out,

[Investigator]

I failed. Get out of here.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

I hope you rot in hell. Because exactly where I wanted to put him was in hell. And I just wanted him to rot in there the way that he allowed my sister to rot for weeks.

[Prosecutor]

Most of the families we have to deal with, this is the worst day of their life. The losing of a loved one. And I can only imagine what goes through victims minds when they see the killer for the first time.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

And for those two Seconds. It felt so good. But at the same time I was stuck in a situation where I couldn't do anything about it and I had to wait.

[Narrator]

Most people would be very surprised to know how much has to go on behind this the scenes in order to get a case to trial. The delays in the criminal justice system can be difficult for families.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

When you watch Law and Order, it takes like two weeks, right? Reality is that it took about four and a half years to go to trial.

[Prosecutor]

He had no defense to I didn't kill Debbie. The evidence was overwhelming. And so then how do you beat self defense in Nevada? We have to disprove self defense beyond a reasonable doubt. This isn't going to be a case about self defense.

[Investigator]

It's going to be a case about murder.

[Prosecutor]

A choice to commit that murder because he wanted something. Thank you.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Let's go ahead and have you proceed, Mr. Banks.

[Investigator]

The government does not have proof of

criminal intent for first degree murder. Our main points were Jason was afraid. And there's a hell of a lot more going on in this case.

Okay. This guy killed his girlfriend, tried to hide the body.

It's not, not that simple. It's a case about state of mind, self defense and it's about second guessing. And the evidence is going to show that he was scared, that he was afraid that she was violent, and that Jason Griffith was defending himself. In December 12, 2010,

[Narrator/Investigator]

prosecutors call almost two dozen witnesses to help reconstruct the events leading up to Debbie's death and its aftermath. One of those witnesses was Kalay Casorso.

[Prosecutor]

Clay Casorso was a former lover of Jason who both Jason and Louis Colombo were going to attempt and store Debbie's body in the cement on her back patio.

[Narrator]

What did you do seeing this item that they wanted to place in your house? Of course, they didn't tell her immediately that Debbie was inside.

[Witness/Interviewee]

Asked what the heck it was and

[Narrator]

what did the defendant say?

[Witness/Interviewee]

He asked if I really wanted to know. And I said yes, if you're gonna put that here, I need to know what it is. And he kinda, he just said, it's Debbie.

[Narrator]

And what was your reaction?

[Witness/Interviewee]

I was shocked. Kind of my head kind of started to spin like I couldn't comprehend it.

[Investigator]

State's next witness, Louis Palumbo.

[Prosecutor]

Louis Colombo was present for the beginning of the incident and was one of the essential witnesses to what happened that night.

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

When I walk in the door, I just look at him for a second. He was just sitting there and then he said something like, he's like, I messed up.

[Prosecutor]

When you walked back to the studio,

[Investigator]

what did you see?

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

Saw Debbie laying on the ground to the studio.

[Investigator]

Did she appear alive or dead to you?

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

She. She appeared dead.

[Prosecutor]

Who does the cutting?

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

Jason did.

[Investigator]

What did he use?

[Louis Colombo (Jason's roommate)]

A handsaw.

[Investigator]

On cross examination, Jason's attorneys don't hesitate to tell the jury that Louis Colombo was given immunity in return for his cooperation in this case.

Our attempts to undercut the credibility of testimony is number one. Anytime a person testifies with a grant of complete immunity, that automatically makes that person's testimony potentially suspect. That is a big factor in what a jury will look at on whether they believe Mr. Colombo or not.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

I was so upset that he was on the stand. Did he take her breath? No. But do I consider him just as bad as Jason? Absolutely.

[Prosecutor]

Ultimately, could he have been prosecuted? He could have, and that's often the case in the criminal justice system. We oftentimes have to make that choice, which is, how badly do we need this person?

[Narrator]

It cannot be overstated how important important Louis statement was with regard to the prosecution of Jason.

[Prosecutor]

So after four days of presenting evidence, we were confident that there was no doubt that the jury knew Jason killed Debbie. It was really at that point we turned it over to the defense that the. The real fight in the trial started.

[Narrator]

Jason was a born performer. He was comfortable in front of a crowd, and certainly as he made his case calculation about whether or not he should take the witness stand. I'm sure he looked at those jurors and he thought to himself, I got this.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

It was about two and a half weeks. I think the trial lasted, and I have to portray this strong woman when inside I'm breaking down slowly, but I'm still holding it together, hoping that we will get justice for my sister. I ask at this time if the defense is prepared to call their first witness.

[Narrator/Investigator]

We are a judge.

[Investigator]

While the defense calls Debbie's ex boyfriend, Jameel, and they call Jason's ex girlfriend, Agnes to the stand, their case really comes down to just one, one person.

The defense calls Jason Griffith.

[Narrator/Investigator]

In claiming self defense, Jason was compelled to testify. And his lawyers quickly sought to portray Debbie as someone that he was genuinely fearful of.

[Investigator]

And we never argued to the jury that Jason is, you know, Mother Teresa, an outstanding citizen. What we argue to the jury is he acted reasonably. Do you recognize that? It was a note that was left on my car at the Mirage. What's your understanding of who left you this?

[Anonymous Witness]

Debbie left me that note.

[Investigator]

I will kill you before I let another bitch have you. I will find you wherever you Hide. Love always your destiny. Is that what it says, Jason?

[Narrator/Investigator]

Yes, sir.

[Investigator]

The prior acts of domestic violence and the 911 calls would lead any reasonable person to believe when there's another incident of violence, that perhaps your life might be at risk.

[Anonymous Witness]

What's going on? My ex girlfriend is. She came to my job today, harassed me at work. She's been making friends. She's following me around town like this harassing stuff needs to stop.

[Investigator]

You said on the 911 call that Debbie was making threats. Tell the jury what kind of threats she was making to you. Oh, she talked about slashing my tires again. She talked about burning my house.

[Anonymous Witness]

Talked about killing me.

[Investigator]

I'll kill you.

[Anonymous Witness]

I'm not gonna let nobody be with you.

[Investigator]

The volume of calls, I thought we did a decent job at showing that that was part of a pattern. He's on the receiving end of the harm.

[Narrator]

Debbie's history and Jason's history and the tumultuous nature of it was particularly relevant in this case to the defense because they, of course, wanted Debbie to look as crazy as possible, as volatile as possible.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Throughout the trial, I would see that my mother was angry. I would just kind of grab her and hold her arm like, I know, Mommy. And don't let this make you emotional.

[Prosecutor]

It was the cross examination of Jason that the whole case was probably going to come down to. Some of the stuff Debbie did was true. Right? She did slash his tire and all of this other stuff. But when it came to the one thing he's hung his hat on, he was lying. And I could prove it.

[Narrator]

So what he testified to was that one night he came out of the Mirage and he came to his car, and there was a note on his car.

[Investigator]

You find that note on his.

Right.

And so now you believe it's Debbie.

[Prosecutor]

What you've said so far.

[Investigator]

Yes.

[Prosecutor]

And you guys continue to have conversations. At least now, unlike before, you have

[Sponsor/Advertisement Voice]

a written threat to kill you, correct?

[Investigator]

Yes.

[Narrator]

And he told the jury that that was written by Debbie, that he was absolutely terrified that this was proof that she wanted to kill him.

[Prosecutor]

Before I get to this, do you

[Investigator]

want a chance to change your answer? I don't need to change the answer, sir. Do you recognize that number? Yes, I know that number. Whose number is it? It's Lou's number.

[Prosecutor]

This is the morning of May 22nd of 2010.

[Investigator]

Okay. Okay.

[Prosecutor]

So that's the morning that the incident

[Investigator]

with the car occurs.

[Anonymous Witness]

Yep.

[Prosecutor]

Here's Mr. Colombo's text to you. I really thought you would know it was me.

[Narrator]

The note was actually written as a joke by Louie. And what we knew from the text messages is that Jason knew that the note was written by Louis and he absolutely knew it. As he sat on the witness stand and he testified before the jury his

[Prosecutor]

entire testimony, Both direct his cross examination, there was no way around it. He lied.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

I'm gonna ask the officers of the court to please come forward and be sworn to take control and custody of the jury.

[Narrator]

Once you have given the evidence to the jury and you've given the case to the jury, you literally just sit and wait.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

The anxiety of, what if this doesn't go the right way? What if he gets away with it?

[Narrator]

There is a roller coaster of emotions While you're waiting for a verdict. Time kind of stands still.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

It just felt like forever. And the jury stood up and when the verdict came in and they said, guilty of murder of the second degree, it was a moment of justification that everything I did for her was for that moment. I was able to breathe and just let go for a second. And I just remember thinking to myself, I hope that I did her proud.

[Prosecutor]

The judge didn't have a lot of discretion. A secondary murder conviction. There's two possible sentences. There's a life sentence and then there's a term of years, which is 25 years. Both of them have minimum parole eligibility. After 10 years, Jason was sentenced for second degree murder to 10 years to life.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

And I've already had to go to parole twice to plea. With the parole board to keep him

[Prosecutor]

in, there is no sense of closure for them. But I certainly think it's better for them to have to show up to a parole hearing than having to realize that he's completely free of the criminal justice system.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Today, Jason continues to serve out his sentence at High Desert State Prison, waiting for his chance of freedom. Many of the people who helped put him behind bars have long since moved on from the case. But there's one final twist to the story.

[Anonymous Witness]

Hello. This is a prepaid debit card call from an offender of the Nevada Department of Corrections, High Desert Correctional Center. I have great news.

[Investigator]

Malcolm in the Middle is back.

My life is fantastic. Now in a four part event. All I had to do is stay

[Anonymous Witness]

completely away from my family.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

Your biggest problem is that we exist.

[Investigator]

Everyone's invited to the can't miss reunion of the year. This family's behavior is toxic to me. You'll just take turns fighting and creating disasters. That's what families do.

Malcolm in the Middle life still unfair.

Now streaming on Hulu and Hulu on

Disney plus for bundle subscribers, terms apply. Ready TV 14O.

This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. You chose to hit play on this podcast today. Smart choice. Make another smart choice with Auto Quote Explorer to compare rates from multiple car insurance companies all at once. Try it at Progressive, Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Not available in all states or situations. Prices vary based on how you buy.

[Friend of Debbie]

This call is from a correction facility

[Anonymous Witness]

and is subject to monitoring and recording.

[Investigator]

Since his conviction for the murder of Debbie Flores Navaj in 2014, Jason Griffith has been waiting for his chance at parole

[Anonymous Witness]

later. With excellent behavior. No infractions, no trouble. Working seven days a week, taking classes, doing everything I can, and they won't give me a second chance.

[Investigator]

Jason has never agreed to a television interview before. He called 2020 from prison to speak for the first time.

[Anonymous Witness]

Debbie Flores is dead, and she did not deserve to die. I'm not trying to get out of responsibility. I'm not trying to diminish what this situation is by any means.

[Narrator/Investigator]

Jason's most recent parole hearing was in 2025. Debbie's sister Celeste was there, ready to oppose his release.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

I knew that I would be facing parole for him. And this time around, when I walk in, the assistant at the front front desk told me, well, you're the first one here. We're also waiting for his wife. I'm sorry, what? Yeah, his wife, Kalei. I thought I was hearing things when she said his wife and then she said her name, Kalei. There was only one Kalei. I was damn near shaking because I had to deal with this woman again who knew of my sister for three weeks that she was missing. There are no words. I just. I. I couldn't speak. I was so angry.

[Narrator/Investigator]

At the parole hearing, Kalei spoke on Jason's behalf,

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

and all I heard was, we just want to apologize to you, Celeste, and I'm sorry. And I just. I just lost it. And I just kept crying. I will never accept your apology, ever. They both deserve each other, and I hope karma finds them and delight delivers it every day, fresh on a plate.

[Anonymous Witness]

I put myself in that situation. If it was my sister, how would I feel? So I hope if never accepting my apology also provides her a level of peace, then that's what she deserves.

[Friend of Debbie]

If there was anything I could say to Blu, I would let him know that you hurt a lot of people. You took someone from this earth that was very loving, caring, and meant a lot to a lot of people.

[Witness/Interviewee]

Why?

[Friend of Debbie]

There wasn't any other way to resolve whatever it was in that moment. Killing somebody is not the way to resolve anything.

[Anonymous Witness]

I want to say that I am sorry that this situation ended the way that it did. And I'm sorry that it costs everyone involved. It cost them so much hurt, so much pain, so much loss. And I'm. I'm responsible for that. I should have been better. I should have done better. I should have figured out something else. Anything else.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Depression is. It's an everyday fight. The more I talk about my sister, the easier it has become. The more I talk about my emotions. I think. I thought that if I bottle it in, I don't have to feel it, I don't have to show it when I should have been talking about it and screaming about it and yelling about it and crying about it.

[Friend of Debbie]

I just really miss my friend. I wish she was here.

[Investigator]

Are you taping this? No.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

You can hear Debbie come into a room before you see her. You smile before she even walks into a room. If you hear her voice, you already know what was coming in. This energy, this love, this caring person.

[Friend of Debbie]

She was so beautiful inside and out. Her spirit was so warm, so welcoming.

It's so tragic that her life was cut so short. It's very heartbreaking. And she had so much to live for. She was a star.

[Celeste Flores Narvaez (Debbie's sister)]

Took her home to Puerto Rico, and we took her to her cemetery where she lays to rest. And she sits on this beautiful mountain where she oversees, like, this beautiful valley. I always visit her and I talk to her. I definitely feel as though. So her spirit is still with me.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

It's so clear that Debbie's spirit is still being felt. By now, Jason Griffith has served 15 years of his sentence. He's been denied parole twice, most recently in 2025.

[Sponsor/Advertisement Voice]

And David, Debbie's sister Celeste says while it's painful, she is attending every parole hearing in hopes that Jason will spend the rest of his life behind bars. That's our program for tonight. Thanks so much for watching. I'm Debra Roberts.

[Interviewer/Investigator]

And I'm David Muir. From all of us here at 2020

[Investigator]

and ABC News, good.

[Witness/Interviewee]

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