Insets, left to right: Tiffany Garza and Jeffrey Lee Devorah (81st Judicial District Attorney’s Office). Background: The area in Texas where Garza’s body was found (Google Maps).
A 47-year-old Texas man may spend the rest of his life in prison for killing his girlfriend and burning her body in a backyard firepit after her 2019 disappearance.
A judge in Atascosa County sentenced Jeffrey Lee Devorah to life in a state correctional facility with the chance of parole after 30 years, authorities announced. The sentence was handed down after a jury in August found Devorah guilty of murdering Tiffany Garza.
As Law&Crime previously reported, Garza was last seen in Poteet, about 30 miles south of San Antonio, on March 25, 2019. The victim’s mother, Lilly Morua, reported her missing on April 26 of that year after Garza was dropped off at a Dollar General store.
According to a press release from the Atascosa County District Attorney’s Office, a tip in July 2019 led Atascosa County Sheriff’s Office investigators and Texas Rangers to a witness who “reported seeing Garza’s murder and helping burn her body in Devorah’s backyard.”
During a three-day search of the property that July, investigators found significant blood evidence inside the house and sifted through a burn pit behind the residence for two days.
“Experts from Texas State University’s Forensic Anthropology Center recovered 14 human bone fragments from the burn pile,” the release states. “They were able to confirm the bones were those of a female between the age of 22 and 56. Tiffany was 37 at the time she was heinously murdered.”
Testing by the Bexar County Crime Lab found a DNA profile that matched Garza herself.
During a 2019 interview with investigators, Devorah said Garza had been living at the property but claimed he knew nothing about her death or disappearance. Sheriff’s investigators believed Garza was murdered between March 28 and April 4, 2019.
Prosecutors said Devorah “made admissions to an ex-girlfriend that were consistent with the physical evidence and the witness’ statements.”
Devorah was arrested in March 2023 and charged with murder.
Garza’s family and close friends were in the Atascosa County courtroom for the sentencing.
“No sentence can restore what her family has lost, but Tiffany’s life — and the truth about what happened to her — deserved every bit of that effort,” District Attorney Audrey Gossett Louis said in a statement. “Tiffany’s life mattered. Our thoughts remain with her family and everyone who loved her.”
Garza’s daughter remembered her mother in a Facebook post, describing her as a “wonderful mom, friend, poker partner, head chef, nail tech, hair stylist, wardrobe stylist, cheerleading and dance coach and every other role she had in my life.”
Natalie Garza said she was pregnant with her own daughter when she last saw her mother in 2019 and that her mother had been excited about becoming a grandmother.
“My daughter is 7 now. She would’ve adored her,” Natalie Garza wrote.
