Deborah Flores-Narvaez: Death of a Showgirl
Colombo's Statement
On January 7, 2011, at approximately 6:40 p.m., investigators brought Louis Colombo to the LVMPD homicide unit to give a statement. According to the police report, Colombo agreed to tell the detectives what had occurred if he would not be arrested or prosecuted with regard to the case because, he said, he did not have anything to do with Flores-Narvaez's death nor did he have any part in the planning of it. Authorities have not said whether they entered into an agreement with Colombo yet; it was said that he had asked for leniency for admitting that he helped Griffith dispose of Flores-Narvaez's remains and that his alleged involvement was still being investigated. In any case, it should be noted that an agreement not to prosecute would have to come from the district attorney.
Colombo declared that, on the night Flores-Narvaez disappeared, she and Griffith had become involved in a physical confrontation in which Colombo had had to pull Griffith off of Flores-Narvaez because he had been choking her with his hands. Colombo said that everything had been okay when he had left the house at 8:20 p.m. to take a relative to another relative's house. At approximately 10:30 p.m., he had received a text message from Griffith asking that Colombo not bring his girlfriend back to the house with him.
When Colombo arrived back at the Russian Olive Street house, he said he had been met by Griffith at the front door. Griffith allegedly told Colombo that this was a "change your diaper moment." At that point, Colombo told investigators, Griffith had walked him to their studio room and showed him where Flores-Narvaez lay dead on the floor. Colombo said that he had then become sick and had to use the bathroom. When he returned, he recounted, Flores-Narvaez lay in the exact position in which she had been when he left the room. He said he could see that she was not breathing, and she was cold to the touch when he assisted Griffith in placing her body into the plastic tub.
Colombo told police that Griffith cut off Flores-Narvaez's clothing before placing her into the plastic tub, and described how Griffith had taped her legs, knees to chest, in such a manner that her body would fit into the tub face up. Using bags of concrete purchased at a Home Depot near their home, which Colombo said they mixed in the garage, they filled the tub with concrete so that it covered Flores-Narvaez's naked corpse and left it in the garage to harden overnight.