A young woman is brutally murdered, sparking a mother’s quest for justice. Who killed Deverrie Schiller?
Episode Media
Episode Sources
- Dead body found at park in California City
- Coroner says woman found in California City park was strangled
- Body of woman found in Cal City park
- Woman identified in Cal City strangulation case
- Three Billboards outside of California City
- Cal City Police raise reward money for unsolved crime victims
- Reward raised to $25,000
- Eight unsolved California City cases featured on Dateline
- Eight Cold Cases, One Small Town
- Murder victim’s mother tries unconventional method to keep daughter’s case alive
- Mother speaks out for justice in Cal City
- Case remains unsolved as Cal City deals with understaffing
- Episode 11 Deverrie Schiller — Murder in My Family Podcast
- Project: loveyou-MissYou-CALLME
- Help Find Who Murdered Boo (Deverrie Schiller) | Facebook
Episode Transcript
Welcome back to Bite-Sized Crime. This week I’m bringing you a cold case that has the potential to be solved with the right information. This episode discusses sensitive topics, so listener discretion is advised.
Deverrie Janae Schiller was born in Los Angeles, California, in October of 1992. Growing up mostly near Great Falls, Montana, Deverrie was known to be a firecracker – smart, funny, beautiful, and determined to live life her own way. Her mother Debi described her as incredible. “If you got the chance to meet her, you never forgot her.”
Debi and Deverrie were as close as a mother and daughter could be. Debi struggled with chronic illness and multiple health conditions that often caused mobility issues. Throughout it all, Deverrie stayed by her mother’s side, doing whatever she could to support her.
In 2015, Debi decided to leave Montana and move back to her hometown of California City, a small desert town in the Antelope Valley, 100 miles north of Los Angeles. Debi had fond memories of Cal City and still had strong connections with the people there. Deverrie – now an adult – told her mom she was coming, too. They found a place to stay on the east side of town, just across from Central Park, Cal City’s main recreation area.
By the summer of 2016, Debi and Deverrie had settled into life in Cal City. Deverrie had been able to make friends pretty easily in her new town. According to Debi, Deverrie’s infectious laugh and twisted sense of humor drew people in, and she never had a shortage of friends to hang out with.
On Saturday, June 25, 2016, Debi and Deverrie had been out all day running errands in the scorching summer heat. Debi wanted to rest that evening, but Deverrie still had energy to burn. A friend came over to the house to hang out, and around 10pm, he and Deverrie decided to walk to the store. Deverrie told her mom that they would be back soon and asked if they could borrow the truck later to run to Taco Bell in the next town over. Debi agreed, calling out, “I love you!” as she watched her daughter head out the front door.
Expecting Deverrie to be back a short while later, Debi was surprised when she realized hours had passed with no sign of her daughter. She wasn’t overly concerned at first – Deverrie was 23 years old and fiercely independent. She was also tough and smart. Besides, she hadn’t been alone when she left the house, and Cal City was a small town. Deverrie had probably just decided to stay over at a friend’s place and would be back in the morning.
But when morning came, Deverrie still hadn’t returned home. Debi tried not to worry, but it wasn’t like her daughter to not let her know where she was.
Then, Debi got a text that would change her life forever. A body had been found in Central Park.
Debi immediately began texting Deverrie, begging her to respond. Panic rising, she got in her truck and drove to the homes of every one of Deverrie’s friends she knew of, but none of them had heard from Deverrie. Debi posted on her Facebook, asking anyone who had seen her daughter to contact her right away.
Late that afternoon, there was a knock on the door. Two police officers stood on the front porch and gave Debi the worst news of her life. Deverrie was gone.
Debi told The Murder in My Family podcast that the next few hours were a blur. She remembered running across the street to Central Park, begging the officers on the scene to let her see her daughter, but Deverrie’s body had already been taken away. Debi described herself as being “beyond distraught,” barely able to put thoughts together as her world crumbled around her.
It would be several months before the details of Deverrie’s death became public.
According to the California City Police Department, they received a call shortly before 10am on Sunday, January 26th. Children playing in the park had discovered a woman’s body on the ground between two fenced-in areas. They raced home to tell an adult what they had found. The adult returned to the park, saw the woman’s body, and called 911. Inexplicably, while waiting for police to arrive, the adult took pictures of the scene on their cell phone and posted them on social media. The pictures were later taken down, but not before Debi saw them. She later recalled how those images of her daughter’s body were forever burned into her memory.
The Kern County coroner’s office announced that Deverrie Schiller had died from strangulation and had likely fought for her life. She was killed so close to home – just a few hundred yards – Debi believes that if she had been outside, she would have been able to hear her daughter’s cries for help.
Cal City Police Sergeant Shannon Hayes took the lead on Deverrie’s case, collecting evidence at the scene and canvassing the area for potential witnesses. He kept in contact with Debi, updating her on the case when he could, but there wasn’t much to say. California City didn’t have a lot of resources, and the police department was severely understaffed. Even though Sgt. Hayes had a few suspects in mind, he didn’t have the funding to support the work.
As time passed, Deverrie’s case seemed to get put on the back burner. But Debi refused to give up. She put up a memorial in the spot where her daughter was killed, a place she called “Deverrie’s Diamond”. Friends and loved ones gathered on Deverrie’s birthday to place flowers and share memories. On one occasion, Debi asked a friend to pose as Deverrie, reenacting how her body was found in the park in the hopes that it would trigger someone’s conscience. She told KGET, “I wanted everybody else to see what I saw in my head every day. I don’t know what else to do to get people’s attention. Somebody somewhere knows something. Nobody can tell me that that’s not true.”
Debi was also frustrated that the police department had recently been focusing all of its attention and resources on breaking up marijuana operations instead of focusing on solving the multiple missing persons cases and unsolved murders in Cal City. In 2018, inspired by the movie Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, Debi decided to place her own billboards along California City Boulevard, the main road leading out of town. The first billboard said, “Busting grow houses is good”; the second: “Busting killers is better”; and the third: “Dev Schiller, 10-92/06-16 murder unsolved”.
Debi told KGET that her purpose in creating those billboards was to stir people up and piss them off. “I don’t want to be doing this. I don’t want to have to share my pain publicly, but I ain’t got a choice. I know the first face she saw when she was born. I have a right to know the last face she saw when she died.”
Over the years, California City has struggled financially, barely managing to pass tax measures to keep public services like the fire and police departments afloat. In 2019, the police department was able to hire three new detectives to help them focus on the 8 unsolved cases in Cal City. The city council also voted to offer a cash reward of $25,000 for information about those cases, one of which was Deverrie’s.
Not long after that, the Cal City cases were featured on Dateline in an attempt to get national attention. Debi told Desert News that she hoped it would lead to progress in Deverrie’s case. “I can assure you the evidence is definitely there. Something will happen and very likely sooner than later. It may not be a direct result of the video but as a result of good police work.”
In the nearly 10 years since Deverrie’s murder, Debi has refused to give up hope. She has her own theories about who is responsible for her daughter’s death, and she believes the case will someday be solved. She told The Murder in My Family podcast, “There’s several suspects. There’s DNA evidence. It’s an odd situation. There’s no lack of theories about who did it and why. They just can’t prove it yet.”
Debi has also dedicated herself to helping others in similar situations. She raised money to buy personal alarm devices for young women in the community and advocated for a memorial bench in Central Park to honor the 8 cold case victims in Cal City. Debi is determined to keep moving forward and make her daughter proud.
As of this recording, Deverrie’s case has not been solved. If you have any information about the murder of Deverrie Janae Schiller on January 25, 2016, please contact Lieutenant Shannon Hayes at the California City Police Department at 760-373-8606. And please share Deverrie’s story – let’s help her get justice.