Debbie Flores Narvaez moved to Las Vegas after college to chase a stage career on the Strip. By 2010, she had landed an ensemble role in Fantasy at the Luxor Hotel & Casino. That dream ended in a case that will be featured in Friday’s edition of 20/20.
Narvaez failed to show up at a midnight rehearsal the night before her premiere, and her roommate called 911 when she did not appear. Friends and family immediately said something was wrong. Deon Ridley told Channel 13 in 2010 that her absence from work and the show, which mattered to her, was unusual. Celeste Florez-Narvaez said it was not like her to go missing, adding that it was not like her to take a small vacation.
Merriliz Monson said she had seen tension between Narvaez and her ex-boyfriend, Jason “Blue” Griffith. Monson said Griffith kept asking Narvaez to wait and respect him while he tried to resolve something by phone. Previous arrest reports said Griffith had already been arrested for attacking Narvaez, including elbowing her in the chin, pushing her down, kicking her and pulling her hair. He was charged with battery and coercion in that attack.
After a month of searching in 2010, police found Narvaez’s body at a home on Bonanza Way after receiving an anonymous tip. Las Vegas police said in January 2011 that the human remains they recovered were Narvaez’s and that Griffith was the suspect. Detectives said Griffith bought cement and rented a U-Haul not long after she was last seen at his home in North Las Vegas, and investigators tracked the truck’s GPS. Police said her body was dismembered, packed into cement-filled tubs and sealed in a closet.
An arrest report also said Griffith and his roommate, Louis Colombo, tried to hide Narvaez’s body at Griffith’s ex-girlfriend’s house in Henderson. Police said the ex-girlfriend refused and tipped them off, but waited weeks to do so because she was afraid of what Griffith could do to her. That detail leaves the case with one enduring answer and one lasting mark: Narvaez was not simply missing, she was killed, and the evidence police described tied the effort to conceal the crime back to the man they identified as the suspect.
