It’s been nearly two months since Deborrah “Debbie” Collier’s death was called “deliberate and personal” by Habersham County officials.
On Friday, authorities said the GBI had ruled the 59-year-old’s bizarre disappearance as a suicide.
Collier was found partially burned and topless down an embankment in some Habersham County woods Sept. 11, more than an hour north of her Athens home, the sheriff’s office previously said. She had been reported missing the day before after an alarming message was sent through a mobile payment application, according to an incident report.
Investigators with the sheriff’s office said they initially believed Collier was killed by someone she knew, and that the incident was not “a random act of violence,” but instead “deliberate and personal.”
Amanda Bearden, Collier’s daughter, said during an interview with the “Crime on the Record” podcast that her whole family turned against her, thinking she might have had something to do with the case. Bearden said on the podcast that she believed her mother had killed herself.
“I think she was dealing with stuff that she didn’t want to burden me with,” Bearden said. “No one saw her that day prior on (Sept. 10). There were actions, my mom was like giving away things that you know now looking back on, I’m like, ‘Well, that was weird.’ ... There were some comments that she made. She had taken that whole week off, well the week of this happening, off from work.”
According to the GBI Medical Examiner’s Office, Collier’s “cause of death was inhalation of superheated gases, thermal injuries and hydrocodone intoxication and that the manner of death was suicide.”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution does not typically report on suicides, but this case generated national attention while investigators worked to determine the cause of death.
During the investigation, the sheriff’s office said 26 search warrants were executed and information was gathered from more than 20 interviews of family members and potential witnesses.
Officials previously said Collier was last seen at a Family Dollar store in Clayton at 3:09 p.m. on Sept. 10, the day before her body was found. During a late September news conference, deputies said security footage showed Collier remained in the parking lot for about 10 minutes before driving away, making her last known sighting at 3:19 p.m.
Bearden said during the podcast that she was never on the phone with her mother during that time.
“I’m not sure why she was there or the amount of time that she was,” Bearden said. “I didn’t speak on the phone with my mother at all on (Sept. 10). We had exchanged some texts prior to that day, but I didn’t speak to her on the phone at all that day.”
But it was during that time that Bearden received $2,385 from her mother through Venmo. At 3:17 p.m., the money and an alarming message was sent to Bearden’s phone. Investigators could not say if the payment was sent from Collier’s phone while she sat in the Family Dollar parking lot.
“They are not going to let me go love you there is a key to the house in the blue flower pot by the door,” the sheriff’s office said the message stated.
Bearden told police she attempted to call Collier but got no answer, according to an incident report. More than two hours after receiving the message and getting no response from her mother, Bearden reported Collier as missing.
After leaving the parking lot, Collier drove south on Ga. 15 toward Little Falls, just inside Habersham, authorities said. Collier’s car was last seen on the road before she stopped at Family Dollar, according to the sheriff’s office. Her Chrysler Pacifica, a rental car she was using after her own car was damaged in a wreck, was seen traveling north on Ga. 15 just after 2:15 p.m.
About 12:30 p.m. on Sept. 11, Habersham dispatch was contacted by a Sirius XM Service representative, who received an alert that the vehicle of a missing person out of Clarke County was in the area of Ga. 15 and Victory Home Lane, according to the sheriff’s office. Bearden said on the podcast that she also headed that way when she got word that her mother might be there.
The rental vehicle was found directly off Ga. 15 northbound on a pull-off that led into an old logging road, the incident report states. The area is about 13 miles from Clayton. At the location, the body of a partially nude and burned woman was found down the embankment, near a red tote bag and a partially burned blue tarp, the sheriff’s office said.
“They were maybe in those woods 10 minutes and the police officer came back and he said, ‘Come here,’ and I knew,” Bearden said. “He was just hugging me. I kept saying, ‘Are you sure? Are you sure? How do you know?’”
According to an incident report, Collier was lying on the ground, without a top, and her skin appeared to be black and bright red in places, as if she was burned. A couple of feet away, it appeared that a fire had been burned in the location recently, the report reveals.
“From the initial discovery on September 11, 2022 to date, the Habersham County Sheriff’s Office Criminal Investigations Division has remained vigilant in seeking out and following up on every possible lead regarding Deborrah Collier’s actions on the weekend of her death,” authorities said. “The Habersham County Sheriff’s Office would also like to extend our deepest sympathies to Mrs. Collier’s family and friends. It is our hope and prayer that the findings of this investigation provide some form of closure and allow for the healing process to begin.”
Collier, a native of Oneonta, Alabama, is survived by her husband, children, stepchildren, grandchildren, brothers, sisters and various nieces and nephews.
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