Texas death row inmate, 54, who murdered his pregnant ex-girlfriend and her seven-year-old son is set to be executed in October

Stephen Barbee, 54, is accused of asphyxiating Lauren Underwood, then 34, and her son Jayden, 7, and then taking their bodies to a wooded area to bury them in a shallow grave. 

A Texas death row inmate convicted of murdering his pregnant ex-girlfriend and her son before burying them in a shallow grave is scheduled to be executed in October.  

Stephen Barbee, 54, strangled to death Lauren Underwood, 34, in 2005 after an argument over his refusal to leave his wife. At the time, she was seven months pregnant with his child.

On the night of the murder, her seven-year-old son ran into the room before he was also killed. 

Barbee then took their bodies to a wooded area where he buried them in a shallow grave.   

He was convicted after a three-day trial in 2006, though he has maintained his innocence, having filed multiple petitions and having had a 2019 appeal rejected by the state.

Barbee met Underwood in 2003 at a bagel store she co-owned in Fort Worth, Texas, according to MSNBC. They broke up in late 2004 after she discovered Barbee was also seeing one of her neighbors. 

By that time, she was pregnant and friends said she had decided to raise the baby without Barbee, who was the father according to court documents.

Lisa Underwood, seen with 7-year-old son Jayden, was seven months pregnant with  Barbee's child at the time of their murder. She had planned to raise the baby alone after breaking up with him. 

On February 19, the day of the killings, a sheriff's deputy had stopped Barbee while he was walking along a service road in the wooded area. He gave the deputy a fake name and then fled. 

Underwood was reported missing by friends when she didn't show up to her own baby shower, according to the Houston Chronicle. 

A pool of blood was found in her home but no sign of forced entry. That prompted an Amber Alert sent out nationwide on February 21. 

The next day, Barbee was arrested and charged with the murder in the town of Tyler, nearly 120 miles east of Fort Worth.  

Police said that Barbee initially denied killing Underwood and her son but eventually confessed to a detective in an unrecorded conversation in a bathroom. 

Prosecutors claimed that Barbee said he started a fight with Underwood before holding her face down in the carpet until she stopped breathing, before doing it to Jayden until he did the same.

Officers found Underwood's car in a creek nearby and determined Barbee was a person of interest. 

When authorities brought him in for questioning, Barbee claimed he hadn't seen Underwood for months. But police say that when he went to the bathroom, he confessed to the murders in an unrecorded conversation with a detective. 

Barbee, seen here in 2005, has maintained his innocence. He filed multiple petitions and had an October 2019 appeal dismissed by the state of Texas. 

Prosecutors claimed that Barbee said he started a fight with Underwood before holding her face down in the carpet until she stopped breathing. Barbee told investigators Underwood kicked him in the leg and he responded by punching her in the face several times, causing her nose to bleed. He held her on the floor and suffocated her, according to the affidavit. 

Police at the time said Barbee told them that he soon after strangled Jayden to death when the boy ran into the room screaming.

Barbee unsuccessfully attempted to tie his case to Dr. Mark Krouse, a former Denton County Medical Examiner who was fired for making over two dozen mistakes on cases during a 2020 investigation.

In earlier appeals, Barbee had told local police that he killed Underwood and her son by accident, but that he was scared and had been coerced. He immediately recanted. He also argued that his lawyers abandoned him and that a videotape of Barbee's interrogation was withheld by the police. 

An execution was scheduled for October 2, 2019, but it was postponed after Barbee appealed, arguing his Sixth Amendment rights had been violated during the trial. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals ruled his case had grounds for an appeal.

During the appeal, Barbee argued that his lawyers did not go along with his wish to maintain his innocence, saying they told jurors he was guilty during their closing arguments. 

He also cited Dr. Mark Krouse, a now-fired Medical Examiner in Denton County who handled one of the autopsies in the case. Krouse was found to have made errors in more than two dozen cases between January and November 2020. 

Despite this, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals dismissed the case in February 2021, saying that his claim of his Sixth Amendment rights being violated had no basis. The state also said that Krouse's autopsies on Underwood and her son were done without error and deemed his eventual firing irrelevant to his case.  

The Texas Court had originally scheduled to happen on July 6 but the state has now rescheduled it for October 12. Texas has already executed two people in 2021. 

This comes after United States Attorney General Merrick Garland put a halt to federal executions in July. There had been a nearly two decade pause on the practice at the federal level. President Trump's Attorney General Bill Barr announced the U.S. would resume them in 2019.