Student’s Wit, Warmth Recalled

Christina “Cris” Burmeister was known at Cal Poly Pomona as the boisterous girl always ready with a quip and the one who seemed to know everyone on campus.

On Friday, Burmeister’s Chi Omega sorority sisters and about 350 others gathered to remember the young woman, whose body was found Aug. 18 in her pickup truck on California 39 in the Angeles National Forest. She had been stabbed to death.

“We’re no longer connected at the hip, but at the heart,” her best friend, Krista Guilliams, said. “She’ll always be a part of my life.”

Burmeister’s father, mother and sister sat up front at the service. All asked not to be interviewed.

“She was very friendly, very talkative,” Chi Omega advisor Stephanie Jacques said.

Burmeister was an apparel merchandising major hoping for a career in fashion, friends said, and she was never shy about telling them their outfits weren’t quite right.

“She always had a sarcastic quip, and she always said it with love,” friend Ben Lopez said. “She was close with everyone she knew.”

The body of the 20-year-old Cerritos resident was found at 9:30 a.m. Aug. 18. Detectives released a sketch and a surveillance photo of a hooded man who used her ATM card to withdraw $400 about an hour and a half after she was last seen. No arrests have been made.

Burmeister was last seen at 10:30 p.m. Aug. 17, when she left home to attend a fraternity party.

“People knew she was on her way,” Lopez said. “They wondered where she was.”

The next morning, friends called one another with the news that Burmeister was missing. Soon, they learned her body had been found.

“She was so fun-loving. She was really a carefree person. There was a wonderful spirit about her,” friend Brian Smith said.