BAYTOWN, Texas – Kirsten Fritch had plans to attend college.
Forensic science was an interest of hers, one that those who knew her said she would have pursued, if only she had gotten the chance.
"She was an honor student and I knew for sure that she would graduate if this wouldn't have happened to her, if she wouldn't have gotten murdered," said Barbara DeRamus, Fritch's grandmother.
Investigators found Fritch's body in a field in Texas City in November 2016. Jesse Dobbs, 22, is charged in her death and is awaiting trial.
According to investigators, Dobbs abducted Fritch, then 16, and drove her from her mother's home in Baytown to Texas City, where her body, with about 50 stab wounds, was recovered.
Fritch's mother, Cynthia Morris, 37, and younger sister, Breanna, 13, were found shot to death at their home in Baytown days before investigators recovered Fritch's body.
Dobbs remains a person of interest in the deaths of Fritch's mother and sister.
As graduation approached, DeRamus figured something could be done to recognize her granddaughter. Fritch would have graduated this June from Robert E. Lee High School in Baytown. DeRamus contacted Fritch's guidance counselor to see if she could be recognized at graduation. The answer was a resounding "yes."
"It's bittersweet, but it means a lot to me," DeRamus told KPRC2, reflecting on the graduation ceremony and the diploma she received in her granddaughter's name.
"Kirsten should have been there to get her own diploma," DeRamus said.
Instead, DeRamus claimed it for her. She knew she had to do something, she said, in memory of her granddaughter, whose life was stolen from her.
Fritch, DeRamus said, would be proud.
"I could just see her smile down from heaven, saying, 'I knew my nanny would do something,'" DeRamus said with a chuckle.
Dobbs is scheduled to go on trial in September.