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24-year-old Jackie Vandagriff was found burnt and mutilated near Grapevine Lake, Texas, on September 14, 2016, just a day after she was reportedly killed.
Although it was difficult to initially determine the murderer, the investigators did not give up. They narrowed down on a personal trainer and bartender, Charles Dean Bryant, who was last seen hanging out in a CCTV camera footage with the victim at a bar on September 13.
Bryant was arrested on September 18, 2016 for an unrelated case; he had broken the restraining order that his ex-girlfriend had put on him. However, investigators were quick to acertain a connection between the two cases and zeroed in on him.
The nerve chilling story will be explored further in Investigation Discovery on February 9 in an episode titled The Murder of Jackie Vandagriff, which is a part of their true-crime series 48 Hours.
Here's a short synopsis of the upcoming episode:
"A 24-year-old Texas college student, Jackie Vandagriff, turned up murdered the morning after meeting a man in a bar, raising the question of her death simply because she looked like the killer's ex-girlfriend."
Trigger warning: This article contains mentions of murder. Discretion is advised.
How was Jackie Vandagriff killed and why did she became the target?
What happened on the fateful night?
Jackie Vandagriff was a college student studying nutrition at Texas Woman’s University during that time. On the fateful evening, she was at Fry Street Public House, a local college bar in Denton, Texas, hoping to land a job at the bar.
There, she crossed paths with Charles Dean Bryant, whom she had never met before and the two started interacting. Cut to the next day, her corpse was discovered near Grapevine Lake, entirely burnt and mutilated.
The 24-year-old's body was so badly burnt that it took days for the investigators to find out her identity and the cause of death could also not be determined at the time. The investigators had hit rock bottom while digging into the case when they finally started joining the dots together.
Bryant was arrested on September 18, 2016, for violating a restraining order ex-girlfriend Caitlin Mathis had against him. As a result, it became easier for the investigators to interrogate him.
As CCTV footage showed Bryant hanging out with Vandagriff at a bar on the day she died, investigators took no time to question him about his involvement.\
Despite being hesitant to confess his involvement initially, he eventually told the investigators that he was the one who killed Jackie. However, he added that she was killed while the two were trying to have kinky s*x.
The investigators were not convinced as they believed that the murder was premeditated.
According to them, it was hard for Charles to accept the rejection from his ex-girlfriend so he entered the bar with a mission to kill someone and incidentally, Jackie looked like his ex-girlfriend.
Charles Dean Bryant faced capital murder charges
The accused was found guilty of first-degree murder and was convicted of capital murder; he was sentenced to life in prison plus 20 years.
Charles is currently serving his sentence at the William P. “Bill” Clements Unit in unincorporated Potter County, Texas.
