Christina Downer Murder: Two Held on $2 Million Bail as LAPD Seeks Charges

Almost a year after she was reported missing, two people have been arrested on suspicion of the Christina Downer murder, the Los Angeles Police Department announced. Downer was the sister of “Saturday Night Live” writer Jimmy Fowlie. Neither of the two has been reported as charged, and the case is at an early stage.

Who has been arrested in the Christina Downer murder case

According to the reports, police arrested Delorean Bijon Brandon, 41, and Kaylee Nicole Markowski, 34, on Thursday. Variety reports that Brandon was arrested in Highland Park and Markowski in Tarzana. Brandon is described as Downer’s boyfriend. Deadline reports that both were booked on suspicion of murder and are being held at Metropolitan Detention Center on $2 million bail each.

The LAPD says detectives identified the pair as the individuals they believe were responsible for the murder, for disposing of Downer’s body and for concealing their involvement. These are allegations made by police. Neither Brandon nor Markowski has been convicted of anything, and the sources include no response from either of them.

How the investigation unfolded

Police say the case began on December 18, 2025, when Downer’s ex-husband requested a welfare check because he had not heard from her for an extended period. The LAPD says Brandon told officers at the time that she had moved out several months earlier, leaving behind her belongings, her car and her dog.

Detectives from the department’s Robbery-Homicide Division took over after Downer’s cellphone was found washed ashore on Santa Monica Beach. Variety also reports that authorities searched an Airbnb property in Joshua Tree, in the high desert several hours from Los Angeles. The search involved K-9 units and the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department. The LAPD’s statement attributes the identification of the two arrested to “various investigative techniques” but gives no further detail.

A family’s public appeal

Fowlie went public days after Downer was reported missing. On December 22, 2025, he posted photographs of his sister and asked for help finding her. Deadline reports he also searched her Koreatown neighborhood with friends and followers, saying they were worried she was not safe.

On April 29 he wrote that the LAPD had told the family Downer was “no longer alive” and that the case had become a homicide investigation. He said the family believed her phone and social media were compromised in the weeks before she disappeared. He alleged that whoever held the phone used it to hide that she was gone, to ask for money and to create a false narrative that she was going “off the grid.” He added that he was sharing her story because he believed whoever was responsible was “hoping to erase her in every way possible.”

What happens next

The LAPD says its Robbery-Homicide Division will present the case to the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office for filing consideration. Prosecutors will decide whether to bring charges and, if so, which ones. The police say the investigation is ongoing.

Until that decision is made, the claims about the Christina Downer murder remain police allegations. The arrests do not settle what happened to her, and any questions about guilt would be a matter for a court.

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