Inside the Disturbing Case of a Calif. Teen Who Was Buried Alive After Boyfriend 'Turned Jealous'

The young men had already dug the hole in the California woods where they planned to bury the 17-year-old before they killed her. 

Daniel Bezemer, 18, had feelings of jealousy about his girlfriend, Justine Vanderschoot, 17, and Bezemer and his best friend, Brandon Fernandez, 21, had decided to kill her, according to Placer County prosecutors.

The high school couple left a family dinner at Justine’s home on Labor Day 2003 and met up with Fernandez.

Then, Bezemer strangled Justine, and put her body into Fernandez’s car. They drove to the woods, stripped Justine of her clothes, poured on her what investigators believe to be methanol and buried her, Deputy District Attorney Timothy Weerts tells PEOPLE.

Both Bezemer and Fernandez later told investigators that Justine had made noises and moved in the grave, according to Weerts.

“She had dirt in her esophagus and lungs,” her mother, Lynnette Vanderschoot, recalled at a parole hearing in 2017. “So she was gasping for air when they buried her.”

A pathologist later said that evidence was consistent with her being buried alive, although it is also possible that she had breathed in dirt before burial. 

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At first, Justine and Bezemer’s relationship seemed like a lot of high school romances: He would come over to her hours to eat dinner with her family. But, prosecutors say, there was also a deep-seated jealousy that ran like a cold current through their young relationship. And, prosecutors say, after Daniel Bezemer “turned jealous,” their relationship was “defined” by his “jealousy and control.”

At 11 that Labor Day night, Placer County Sheriff’s detectives – accompanied by a chaplain – knocked on the Vanderschoots’ door.

“Your daughter’s not coming home,” the parents remember them saying.

Prosecutors say both Bezemer and Fernandez eventually confessed to killing Justine.

Bezemer was convicted of first-degree murder and in 2005 sentenced to 25 years to life in prison. Now 40, Bezemer had a parole consultation in August 2020, followed by a hearing nearly two years later, according to his records. The Valley State prison inmate was denied in both 2022 and 2023 and is tentatively slated for another hearing in March 2028.

Convicted of second-degree murder, Fernandez was sentenced to 15 years to life. Fernandez, who is now 42, first came up for parole in 2017 and again in 2022, per his inmate records. He was denied both times and has a tentative third parole suitability hearing slated for July 2027.

Fernandez has also petitioned the court for resentencing in an effort to be released early from San Quentin State Prison, based on California law that went into effect in 2019, which can decrease the legal liability of a murder accomplice.

“We ask, what kind of message are we sending to our young women – that someone can plan, scheme and execute a horrific murder against a teenage girl and be eligible for legal relief?” Justine’s family said in a statement after his petition was denied, calling the reform law “misguided.”

In denying his petition earlier this year, the Placer County Superior Court judge noted that for decades, both men fabricated events connected to Justine’s carefully planned killing: Bezemer had helped dig Justine’s grave in advance, knew its location, and, soon after changed his tires on the vehicle used to drive her to her grave. 

Recently, in a move in which Placer County District Attorney Morgan Gire said Justine’s family had “turned their pain into purpose,” her relatives worked with prosecutors to draft state legislation – approved by the governor last year – providing teen dating violence education in California schools. 

“By teaching our youth healthy boundaries and the early signs of teen dating violence, we hope to prevent future victims and aggressors,” Gire added.

If you are experiencing domestic violence, call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233, or go to thehotline.org. All calls are toll-free and confidential. The hotline is available 24/7 in more than 170 languages.