Danielle van Dam (September 22, 1994 – February 2002) was an American girl from the Sabre Springs neighborhood of San Diego, California, who disappeared from her bedroom during the night of February 1–2, 2002. Her body was found by searchers on February 27 in a remote area. Police suspected a neighbor, David Alan Westerfield, of the killing. He was arrested, tried, and convicted of kidnapping and first-degree murder. He was sentenced to death and is currently incarcerated at San Quentin State Prison.
The crime
On the evening of Friday, February 1, 2002, Danielle van Dam's mother Brenda and two girlfriends went out to a bar, called Dad's, in Poway. Danielle's father, Damon, stayed at home with Danielle and her two brothers. Damon put Danielle to bed around 10:30 p.m., and she fell asleep. Damon also slept until his wife returned home at around 2:00 a.m. with four of her friends. Brenda noticed a light on the home's security alarm system was flashing, and discovered that the side door to the garage was open. The six chatted for approximately half an hour, then Brenda's friends went home. Damon and Brenda went to sleep believing that their daughter was sleeping in her room. About an hour later, Damon awoke and noticed that an alarm light was flashing. He found the sliding glass door leading to the back yard open, so he closed it. The next morning Danielle was missing, and her parents called the police at 9:39 a.m.
Danielle became the subject of search efforts, with hundreds of volunteers searching deserts, highways and remote areas for weeks. The Laura Recovery Center assisted in organizing the search, and a Danielle Recovery Center was set up in a real estate office in Poway to coordinate the searching. Finally, on February 27, two searchers found her nude, partially decomposed body near a trail in Dehesa, California, an unincorporated town east of San Diego. Some searchers had decided to search the Dehesa Road area, near the trail, after detectives discovered traces of Danielle's blood in David Westerfield's motor home, because Dehesa Road was a possible route Westerfield could have taken to get to the desert. Because of the condition of the body, the coroner was unable to determine the cause of death or whether she was sexually assaulted, and had to use dental records to confirm her identity.
David Westerfield
Law enforcement officials interviewed the van Dams' neighbors the Saturday morning of Danielle's disappearance, and discovered that one neighbor, David Westerfield, was not at home.
Westerfield (born February 25, 1952), 49 years old at the time, was self-employed as an engineer and held several patents for medical devices.
He graduated from James Madison High School. He had no criminal record at the time, and was a divorced father of two college students. He lived two houses away from the van Dams, and owned a luxury motor home.
About three days before Danielle's disappearance, Danielle and Brenda had sold Girl Scout Cookies to Westerfield, who invited them into his home. Brenda asked to see his kitchen because she had noticed it was being remodeled when they had sold cookies to him the year before.
On Saturday morning, Westerfield fetched his motor home from another part of town, stocked it with supplies, and left home at 9:50, minutes after Brenda called 911 to report Danielle missing. Westerfield later told police that he had driven around the desert and the beach in his motor home, and had stayed at a beach campground: this was later confirmed by witnesses, cell phone records, gas receipts and credit card records. Westerfield said he had intended to go to the desert, but realized he had forgotten his wallet, so instead he drove to the campground at Silver Strand State Beach. He paid in advance for a two-night stay. However, he decided the weather was too cold, so returned home to look for his wallet, after which he went to the desert. A witness at Silver Strand later testified he saw Westerfield pull out his wallet while at the campground. He drove to the desert, where he got stuck in the sand on Sunday morning about a quarter mile off the road and needed help from a tow truck to get free.
On his way home on Monday morning, a sleepy-looking and bare-footed Westerfield stopped at his regular dry cleaners and dropped off two comforters, two pillow covers, and a jacket that would later yield traces of Danielle's blood. When law enforcement first interviewed Westerfield, he did not mention going to the dry cleaners, although he detailed almost every other stop on his outing.