LAPD Arrests Boyfriend of 'SNL' Writer's Sister on Suspicion of Murder

Police say Delorean Bijon Brandon and Kaylee Nicole Markowski were responsible for Christina Downer's murder; each is held on $2 million bail.

When Christina Downer went missing, her boyfriend told detectives she'd moved out months earlier and left her car and her dog behind, police said.

On Thursday, Los Angeles Police Department Robbery-Homicide detectives arrested that boyfriend, Delorean Bijon Brandon, 41, along with Kaylee Nicole Markowski, 34, on suspicion of murder, ABC7 reported. Police say the two were responsible for Downer's killing, for getting rid of her body and for hiding their part in it. Fox LA reported that Downer was 38 and that her brother is Jimmy Fowlie, who once wrote for "Saturday Night Live."

She'd last been in touch with anyone in late November, the LAPD said, according to NBC News. She was reported missing Dec. 18, 2025, after her ex-husband, who hadn't heard from her in a long while, asked police to check on her.

The case moved to Robbery-Homicide after her cellphone turned up, washed ashore on Santa Monica Beach.

By spring, Fowlie was telling the public what police had told his family. In an April 29 Instagram post, he wrote that the LAPD had informed them his sister was "no longer alive" and that the missing-person case had become a homicide investigation, Fox LA reported. "She was a beautiful person who matters in this world, especially to me," he wrote.

In the same post, Fowlie wrote that the family had reason to believe her phone and social media were compromised in the weeks before she vanished, NBC News reported. He wrote that whoever held the phone used it to hide her absence, to ask for money and to suggest she was going "off the grid."

The search stretched well past the city. Earlier in October, investigators combed an Airbnb property in Joshua Tree with K-9 units and the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department, NBC News reported. Authorities said they were looking for evidence and didn't confirm they were searching for remains.

Detectives picked up Brandon in Highland Park, on Garvanza Avenue's 6000 block, and Markowski on a Tampa Avenue block in Tarzana. Each is now held at the Metropolitan Detention Center on $2 million bail, police said. Police have said only that detectives used a range of investigative methods to identify the pair.

Robbery-Homicide detectives plan to bring the case to the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office, where prosecutors will decide whether to file charges against Brandon and Markowski. Police say the investigation is still open.

Source: abc7.com, retrieved October 31, 2026. Other sources: foxla.com, NBC News.