A Fort Worth man convicted of killing a pregnant mother and her 7-year-old boy will be executed on Oct. 12 after his initial execution date was postponed in 2019. According to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Barbee "asphyxiated a 34-year-old white female and a 7-year-old white male, transported their bodies to a wooded area, and buried them."
Barbee was stopped by a sheriff's officer strolling along a service road in a forested area on the day of the killings, but the man fled the scene after giving a false identity. Authorities then discovered Underwood's vehicle in a nearby stream and chose to speak with Barbee as a person of suspicion.
Barbee said he hadn't seen Underwood in months when cops initially brought him in for questioning. However, authorities claim that he confessed to everything in an unrecorded discussion with one detective when he went to the restroom. Barbee acknowledged instigating an argument with his girlfriend, then pushing her face down in the carpet until she stopped breathing, and then putting his palm over Jayden's mouth until he stopped breathing as well, according to prosecutors. Later, Barbee led police to the small graves where he buried the woman and her son after admitting his guilt.
Stephen Barbee, 54, was found guilty of the murders of Lisa Underwood and her son, Jayden, in February 2006. He has always maintained his innocence, alleging that he was coerced into admitting it by the police. In October 2019, he appealed his conviction, saying that his Sixth Amendment rights had been violated during his trial.
From the reintroduction of capital punishment in the United States in 1976 (starting in 1982 with the Brooks execution) through June 30, 2021 (the execution of John William Hummel), Texas has executed 572 criminals, accounting for more than a third of the national total.
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