Posted on 02/22/2005 10:09:10 AM PST by Dubya
FORT WORTH -- The bodies of a missing seven-months pregnant woman and her 7-year-old son were found Tuesday morning off Farm Road 407 in Justin, just hours after police arrested a Fort Worth man charged with capital murder in their disappearance.
It was not immediately disclosed how Lisa Underwood, 34, and her son, Jayden, were killed.
Stephen Barbee, 37, who previously had been romatically involved with Underwood, was taken into custody in Tyler and held initially with bail set at $2 million. He was later released to Fort Worth police and transported back to Tarrant County.
Police on Monday found Underwood's Dodge Durango abandoned in a creek bed off Farm Road 2449, just east of Interstate 35W in Denton County, about 10 miles north of where the bodies were found.
Lt. Gene Jones confirmed an arrest had been made in the case but declined to comment further.
Sources said major case detectives traveled to Tyler on Monday night by helicopter after requesting that Tyler police locate Barbee and take him to their headquarters to be interviewed by Fort Worth police.
It was unknown how police knew Barbee was in Tyler.
About the same time that Tyler police were taking Barbee into custody, Fort Worth police raided a residence in the 4100 block of Walnut Creek in north Fort Worth, a home where Barbee lived with a woman named Trish.
A neighbor who did not want to be identified said she was awakened by flashing police lights and noise about 3 a.m. Tuesday. She said officers went to the back of the residence and later came out the front carrying four or five bags of evidence.
The house, she said, had been under police surveillance since Sunday with officers in unmarked police vehicles cruising through the neighborhood.
About 8 p.m. Sunday, she said, officers came to her home asking "when was the last time I saw them and what kind of cars did they drive." She said she told them she last saw Barbee earlier Sunday.
At 11 a.m. Monday, she said, she saw officers rummaging through trash bags that had been set curbside outside the residence.
The discovery comes more than three days after relatives last heard from the 34-year-old mother, seven months pregnant with her second child.
Police issued an Amber Alert for the mother and son Saturday after relatives discovered a pool of blood inside Underwood's north Fort Worth home and noticed her sport utility vehicle missing.
On Monday, the search for the pair shifted to Denton after authorities found Underwood's blue 2002 Dodge Durango abandoned in a creek bed off Farm Road 2449, just east of Interstate 35W.
The search ended about 6:30 p.m. Monday before resuming this morning.
Party planned
Saturday was supposed to be a day of celebration.
Underwood is expecting a little girl, and her friends and family had planned to throw her a baby shower at Boopa's Bagel Deli, which she co-owns with her best friend, Holly Pils.
Marla Hess, who had traveled from Wichita Falls for the shower, looked forward to prying out of Underwood the name she had chosen for her unborn child.
Because "Jayden" is such an unusual name, family and friends assumed that Underwood had also picked an unconventional name for her daughter.
"She had a name that she wasn't going to tell us," Hess said. "We were going to try to make her."
But Underwood never made it to the party.
A farmer discovered the SUV about 8:28 a.m. Monday and called Denton police.
Throughout the day Monday, searchers scoured nearby pastures and wooded areas, some in helicopters, others on horseback and on foot with trained scent dogs.
Kamper said searchers found the keys to Underwood's SUV but declined to comment on whether they found blood in the vehicle or other evidence inside it.
The area where the SUV was found is largely isolated farmland, although signs along Farm Road 2449 point the way to a new housing subdivision just to the north. Monday afternoon, dozens of patrol vehicles, unmarked cars and media trucks lined the rural road.
Meanwhile, about 30 miles away, more police vehicles and yellow crime scene tape encircled the Underwoods' modest red brick home in the 3700 block of Chaddybrook Lane.
Neighbors talked quietly outside their homes as children rode bikes and drew on the sidewalks with colored chalk.
"They are awesome," said neighbor Vicki Wilson. "They are the nicest people anyone would want to meet. They are very, very sweet."
Wilson said Jayden and the other neighborhood children often played soccer together or came to her house to play on the swing set or swim in her pool.
Jayden was "kind of shy, but ... a smart, intelligent, happy little boy," Wilson said.
Jayden was a first-grader at North Riverside Elementary School. Today, extra counselors will be on hand to talk to the students, said Jason Meyer, a spokesman of the Keller school district.
Customers knew 'Boopa'
Outside Boopa's Bagel Deli, well-wishers left messages and trinkets of hope.
A large brown teddy bear, several notes and balloons graced the window.
Scrawled in colored markers were the words "God Bless Lisa and her two little angels." Another one read: "We're praying for you! Lisa, Jayden and Baby Underwood."
A lined piece of notebook paper bore a child's handwriting: "I'm sure she's OK. I miss her as much as you do. I hope you're going to be OK."
It was signed with a heart and a face with a frown.
Pils said Lisa Underwood had named her bagel shop "Boopa" after a nickname that her mother, Sheila, had bestowed upon her grandson.
Jayden expressed pride in having his nickname adorn his mother's business.
"He wanted to be referred to as one of the owners because he said, 'My name is on the building,'" Pils said.
Deli customers knew Jayden and often asked for him by name.
"They would say, 'Is Boopa here today?'" Pils said.
Pils said that Jayden often passed the time helping her and his mother in the shop, in Fossil Creek Plaza at Western Center Boulevard and Beach Street.
"He would sweep better than our employees," she said. "He loved being at the bagel shop, he was just a real special guy. I love being around him. He is a joy, just a complete joy."
Pils said Underwood has worked hard to provide for her son, who is active in Cub Scouts and soccer and can easily beat Pils at chess.
"He was a wonderful child because she was a wonderful mother."
Pils said Underwood has been looking forward to becoming a mother a second time.
"She felt like, 'I have a perfect boy. Now, I want a perfect girl,'" she said.
Staff Writers Kelly Melhart and Alex Branch Contributed to This Report Deanna Boyd, (817) 390-7655 dboyd@star-telegram.com
If you can not understand my point of view, please leave me alone. and really, the name calling is childish.
It would appear to me that the glaring problem highlited by this murder and the Peterson case is the fact that there are more and more men who would rather murder than pay child support or be fathers.
The guy is nothing but a dead man walking.
No, your life is sad because you are demonizing a woman you do not know, never have met because she is pregnant and not married. You know nothing of the father of the boy. Even if it turns out she was not married to him that does not mean she deserved this end. She seems like a decent woman poor choices? probably, but who has not made them.
You sound like an old coot with erectile dysfuction.
There is NO DOUBT about the devastating tragedy here. She evidently had friends and family that loved her, her children and supported her. We don't know her life story but from an objective view, she did not make the best choices in at least her second baby's daddy....do you disagree?
Whether she was married to the little boy's dad and tried for a family where there would be a mother and father to love and protect each other and their children, we don't know. If she did, it didn't work out like a lot of marriages these days. However, she at least made the choice to give life to the baby she was carrying.
All that said, I agree that marriage is the best arrangement to nurture, support and protect children.
You blame the mother of the children for not picking better men, and you're calling ME childish. Laughable. And if you don't want replies, don't post.
That is what I find interesting....
Both the Peterson case and the Hacking murder involved a married couple.
I don't think single or married has much to do with the midset of a man intent on killing a woman carrying his child.
Isn't there an Oprah! episode you can go watch? A stable home doesn't include getting knocked up by scumbags.
Nobody is saying she deserved to be killed. What people are saying is that her situation ought to serve as a warning to women. Women are murdered and abused far more often by boyfriends than husbands. In fact, married women are far safer than cohabiting or single women.
But time after time I have seen women hook up with known scumbags with a violent past.
Are you associated with Yellowdoghunter??
If they were killed somewhere other than their home, then it could be three charges of capital murder under the category of intentional murder while in the course of kidnapping.
Oh my! Lust is truly altered then :0!
What's with all these yellowdogs?.....
And neither do you.............
It is apparent that all of us are sad and distraught that this horrible crime has happened once again to a wonderful woman, her innocent son and unborn baby.
We are searching from our own experiences to come to grips with this all too familiar crime.
Laci Peterson picked a murdering lying cretin for a husband ....so perhaps there is no way to be certain of the parent you choose for your children....in the future I will keep my thoughts to myself and stay away from this forum, which is not as judgemental as I.
hf
I don't consider that a sarcastic question. Pretty good one, actually.
Btw, I can give you a list of women I've known (no, not in the Biblical sense) who've had children with men even after they've filed restraining orders against them, for abuse. And these were women who were well liked and intelligent.
However, this article doesn't say a single thing about the guy who was charged with murder. There is nothing about a history of abuse, jail time, etc.
In other words, there is nothing to indicate whether or not the woman made a poor choice and an awful lot is being inferred with very little information.
Bodies of mother, son found in Justin
(BREAKING TX)Excerpt:FORT WORTH -- The bodies of a missing seven-months pregnant woman and her 7-year-old son were found Tuesday morning off Farm Road 407 in Justin, just hours after police arrested a Fort Worth man charged with capital murder in their disappearance.
It was not immediately disclosed how Lisa Underwood, 34, and her son, Jayden, were killed.
Stephen Barbee, 37, who previously had been romatically involved with Underwood, was taken into custody in Tyler and held initially with bail set at $2 million. He was later released to Fort Worth police and transported back to Tarrant County.
Police on Monday found Underwood's Dodge Durango abandoned in a creek bed off Farm Road 2449, just east of Interstate 35W in Denton County, about 10 miles north of where the bodies were found.
Please let me know if you want ON or OFF my Texas ping list!. . .don't be shy.
No, you don't HAVE to be a Texan to get on this list!
Did the children pick the loser?
No body is perfect, yellowdoghunter. Monsters, for the most part look just like everyone else, and often have trained themselves to behave in ways that make them appear to be the most harmless and trustworthy individuals on earth.
The Lady was likely no more beguiled by the perp than everyone else who came in contact with him. Wait and hear how shocked everyone who knew him are, to find he is capable of the atrosity he has committed.
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