On Wednesday, a man was convicted guilty of first-degree murder for killing a 16-year-old girl from Morena Valley after she got him kicked out of school. He then concealed her corpse someplace in the San Bernardino Mountains.
After little over a day of deliberations, a Riverside jury issued its decision against Owen Skyler Shover, 23, of Hesperiav, finding true a special circumstance accusation of laying in wait for Aranda Briones’ death in 2019.
Shover, who is being detained without bail at the Byrd Detention Center in Murrieta, faces a mandatory life term without the possibility of parole.
In March, his brother, 27-year-old Gary Anthony Shover of Hesperia, agreed to be an accessory after the fact in a plea deal with the District Attorney’s Office. He was sentenced to 12 months of criminal probation.
According to District Attorney Mike Hestrin’s trial brief, Aranda and Shover went to Moreno Valley High School in the fall of 2017.
Hestrin stated that on the morning of November 7, 2017, Aranda chose to join her companions, including Shover, in Community Park rather than attend courses. A sheriff’s school resource officer hunting for truants noticed the adolescents in the park and approached them, causing the youngsters to scatter in several directions. Shover had a small-caliber pistol and threw it at Aranda while begging for her to hide it, according to court documents.
The victim was terrified and promptly flung it into a drainage channel. However, the deputy caught her in the act and subsequently arrested and questioned her, along with school authorities, at which time she admitted that Shover was the one with the pistol, Hestrin said.
The incident was brought before the local school board in February 2018, and members voted to dismiss Aranda and Shover. She enrolled at a local continuing school, while Shover left his mother’s Moreno Valley home to attend a continuation school in Hesperia. But he was furious at being ejected and what he saw as Aranda’s treachery.
Detectives with the Sheriff’s Central Homicide Unit later found a series of Snapchat, Facebook, and other interactions conducted by the defendant between November 2018 and January 2019, during which he sought to acquire a handgun, according to the brief. He ultimately acquired one.
Shover texted Aranda on Jan. 12, 2019, encouraging her to accompany him the next day while he conducted drug deliveries and “robs drug dealers,” according to the brief. She agreed to meet him at Bayside Park, and they met just before 5 p.m. on January 13, 2019. Hestrin said that with two of her companions watching, Aranda got into the defendant’s Nissan Versa and drove north toward Box Springs Mountain.
She uploaded multiple photos on social media within an hour, showing her and Shover in his car, expressing her joy to be with her “homie,” who was allowing her to handle some of the driving, according to the brief.
For around 20 minutes, the occupants of the Nissan were traced across Box Springs Mountain using mobile phone tower “pings,” Moreno Valley’s Citywide Camera System, and security cameras set outside nearby residences. According to court filings, the car headed north toward San Bernardino soon before 6 p.m., heading for a mobile home park.
Shover emailed his brother via Facebook while en route, saying, “Be prepared for tonight. The brief states, “Get shovels and lighter fluid ready.”
The defendant grabbed Gary Shover from the park, and the two traveled north into the San Bernardino Mountains on state Routes 138 and 18. Between 8:33 p.m. and 10:14 p.m., the defendant turned off his cell phone, rendering the signal illegible. It reactivated when he arrived at his father’s home at 16210 Grevillea St., according to prosecutors.
In the following weeks, Aranda’s relatives and friends filed reports with the sheriff’s department, assuming she had been the victim of foul play. The investigation began as a missing persons case, but “became a homicide investigation (because detectives) found extensive and compelling evidence that the defendant meticulously planned and carried out the murder of Aranda,” Hestrin stated.
One of the key points was a search of the Nissan, during which the blood detector Luminol was sprayed in the trunk, revealing “the possible presence of a significant amount of blood that had pooled toward the bottom of the trunk, underneath the carpeting,” according to Hestrin.
DNA was extracted from the car, and he claimed it was eventually proven to be a match for Aranda.
Law enforcement and volunteer organizations have scoured the mountains where they suspect Aranda’s bones were discarded, but no sign of her has ever been discovered.
Riverside County Superior Court Judge Timothy Hollenhorst has set a sentencing hearing for October 25 at the Riverside Hall of Justice.