She was a California comeback story, serving juvenile probation in a UC Davis dorm for killing a teen — then she was arrested again
At 15, she was placed on juvenile probation in Sacramento County for the killing of 15-year-old Omari Lowery. Nearly five years later, the same woman was arrested in her UC Davis dorm room, accused of selling drugs while still under juvenile commitment, according to arrest records reviewed by CBS California Investigates.
Her probation officer searched the dorm room on July 29 and reported finding live ammunition hidden in a sock in her dresser, a digital scale, more than 100 plastic baggies, text messages and a price list appearing to show drug sales, and $4,121 in cash. Investigators also reported finding marijuana and boxes of vape cartridges — all items that court records say were barred by her release conditions.
CBS California is not naming her because she was a minor at the time of the original offense. Her sentence had not ended, and she remained under juvenile commitment when she was arrested and charged as an adult in Yolo County.
Her path to campus began after she served roughly three years in secure juvenile custody. A Sacramento County judge found she had made enough progress to move her into California's Less Restrictive Programming, or LRP, a system that lets courts transfer young offenders from secure facilities into community-based settings before their sentences are complete. Those settings can range from halfway houses to, in this case, a university dormitory.
She entered UC Davis's Underground Scholars program, a state-funded initiative for incarcerated and formerly incarcerated students, and moved into campus housing in December 2025. Seven months later, she was arrested in that dorm.
The case is now playing out in two counties. In Yolo County, she faces a felony charge of possession of ammunition by a prohibited person, a misdemeanor count of possession of ammunition on school grounds, and a misdemeanor count of possession of marijuana for sale. She pleaded not guilty at her July 31 arraignment and posted $25,000 bail. In Sacramento County, she also faces a probation violation tied to her original 2021 juvenile case. The Yolo County record does not address her custody status in the juvenile matter.
Her placement was conditioned on weekly meetings with Gunner Johnson, director of Underground Scholars at UC Davis. CBS California Investigates has reached out to Johnson with a series of questions about the program.
The arrest came months after California officials held her up as a success story. Records show she served as a youth advocate for the Office of Youth and Community Restoration, the state agency that oversees the LRP system, and she was named in a March 2026 OYCR presentation. OYCR later confirmed she has been on its Youth Advisory Board since 2025, but said it does not fund UC Davis's program and referred supervision questions to the county.
The case has also revived scrutiny of similar placements. In 2021, a 17-year-old girl was convicted of murdering Fresno State student Sergio Bonboster, whose body was dismembered, burned and dumped in a canal. Now in her 20s, she was reported to be enrolled at Sacramento State last year under Project Rebound, the Cal State version of Underground Scholars, after serving two years of a four-year sentence. The victim's family publicly protested her release; Sacramento State would not confirm her enrollment, citing privacy.
In Los Angeles, a private company has been running a similar program in student housing on UCLA's sorority row, according to a California Post investigation. Los Angeles County paid the company $1.2 million in 2025 to house nine young adults.
Underground Scholars is one of three state-supported pathways into California higher education for incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people, alongside Cal State's Project Rebound and the Rising Scholars network in the community college system. Project Rebound enrolled 1,522 students statewide last year across 20 Cal State campuses, according to publicly available information. CBS California Investigates could not find a comparable enrollment count for Underground Scholars and has requested that data from multiple sources.
The lack of central data has become a central issue. OYCR describes the LRP educational pathway programs as building a “prison-to-university pipeline.” But the agency could not say how many young people are enrolled in these programs, which campuses they are on, or where state funding goes. It also could not provide recidivism or completion data, including how many participants have violated probation, been arrested, or finished the program. The agency said such record-keeping is a county responsibility and that collecting it centrally falls outside its authority.
The gaps extend to basic oversight. OYCR's own public list of Underground Scholars partner campuses does not include UC Davis, even though the young woman at the center of this story was placed there. UC Davis said she joined Underground Scholars in January 2025, worked 10 hours a week as a paid peer mentor as part of her court requirements, and served on OYCR's Youth Advisory Board, traveling to speak on juvenile justice issues. The university said she met all program requirements, was monitored by the courts, and was attending summer school near completion of her degree when she was arrested. UC Davis said 92 students were enrolled in the program in 2026, including 14 who graduated.
The university did not answer questions about her day-to-day supervision, including whether her required weekly meetings with Johnson continued through July.
A bill meant to bring more transparency to the LRP system passed the state Senate 37-1 in May, but it was held in the Assembly Appropriations Committee's suspense file on Aug. 13 — a procedural move that killed it without a floor vote or public explanation. Assembly Appropriations Chair Buffy Wicks did not respond to questions about her decision to effectively kill the oversight bill there, and Speaker Robert Rivas's office also did not provide an on-the-record response.
CBS California Investigates has filed multiple public records requests for the contracts, funding records and enrollment data behind these programs. A full accounting will require contacting every campus running one of the three pathways — roughly 20 CSU campuses, at least eight UC campuses, and dozens of community colleges — because no state agency compiles the numbers in one place. This is the first story in what CBS California Investigates expects to be an ongoing series on the state's LRP system; more will follow as records are received.