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
AMEN, we know nothing about this victim or her child. To say anything negative about her is rediculous!
I certainly didn't read an implication that she deserved to be dead. I suppose your mileage (and appparently that of many others here) varied. I read it to say something that needs saying, and even more so needs listening to.
Some men are scumbags (as are some women). Ladies, girls, females in general, you do NOT deserve to die because you choose badly. But if you choose well, you are decreasing the chances that you will be murdered.
I saw alot of posts here accusing another poster (who I don't know and don't even recall reading before, but then I rarely pay attention to names) of something I didn't see him (her?) say. I think people got very riled up and angry and started accusing. I don't really understand why.
And let me add, I think this is just devestating. I don't understand how someone gets to the place where they can wantonly murder anyone, especially a small child. God bless their souls, and God give me the grace to pray also for the perp because it is hard to imagine he deserves it.
sundero
Do you ever read the Gen X threads on this forum? It seems the "conservative" youngsters are mad because we DID let them play Nintendo. :-)
I think I read that he and Lisa had broken up a while back and he was already living with someone else........I'll bet you this is going to come down to him not wanting to pay more child support - as incredibly stupid as that may sound - what an idiot
Re: Your verbal dual with Yellowdoghunter
You should be aware that the forum we all once found here at FR to be inspiring and a gleam of hope in a sea of darkness, is mirroring the de-evolution of civil discourse in society...only from a far right perspective. We are on the fast track to becoming what we railed against for so long where freedom of thought is limited, and angst and infighting abounds.
Coming up on FOX Linda Vester - live...press conference from Police on this story.
"I said it was a sad story. One that probably did not have to happen. I do feel much empathy for the son and unborn baby. If only their mother had made better choices.....we would not be here right now.
I have just seen too many mothers drag man after man into the house, have kid after kid, with different men.....I am just tired of women sacrificing their children on an alter of lust....."
The facts aren't in and we shouldn't assume she was another Amber Frey. For all we know, she could have had a dishonorable husband who left the family, and the killer could have been the first man she dated. Many single moms date "man after man" because men use them and have no intention of being "daddy."
Thanks for posting that info. Nothing she did though justifies her getting murdered.
Ouch, what an over generalization of women!
The really sad thing is that a lot of threads are turning out this way on FR lately. Lots of pontificating by morally superior people willing to cast truck loads of stones.
I understand what you are saying. I preach it to my kids, in one way or another, every day. As parents, we ALL are trying to raise our kids to make good choices. Beginning when they start school and choosing their friends. Needless tragedy and heartbreak can go along with poor judgement and lack of morals and values.
That being said; I hope the killer suffers in hell.
That's worse than murder, you know.
Some days it sure feels like it.
"The really sad thing is that a lot of threads are turning out this way on FR lately. Lots of pontificating by morally superior people willing to cast truck loads of stones."
Too true. This post should have been about the tragedy that has just unfolded and respect for the lives lost.
Yeah, ok.
"Why? Why? Why?"
Because sh*t happens, for one thing-this is the real world. And sh*t happens over and over because we are too busy asking why? why? why? to get about the business of seeing that what ever the answer to why? why? why?, the perp never again gives us cause to ask why? why? why?.
Evil can only be made extinct,one perp at a time.
He he he,
What I always think of is near the end of Addams Family II (I know, I know)...when Joan Cusack is explaning why she has become a psychopathic murderer....
Something about "They got me a Ballerina Barbie! Oh the HORROR! I had asked for a MALIBU BARBIE!!"
And whole Addams family expresses sympathy for her plight.
Reminds me of these thread in a way....the horror gets buried by the excuses.
OH FOR GAWDS SAKE, quit while you're ahead.
You've made a fool of yourself on a thread about a dead woman, and now you're going to try to make US the issue?
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