Baby Be Mine (7 page)

T
he man who emerged from the dirty red import had short dark brown hair, lighter blond eyebrows and moustache and a darker goatee streaked with grey. The woman had shoulder-length dirty blond hair, heavy eyebrows, prominent cheekbones and a receding chin. She wore oversized glasses and was skinnier than any new mother should be. She looked pretty, but haggard.

The man, in an act of touching chivalry, went around to the passenger's side of the car and opened the door. He helped the woman out of the vehicle and on to her feet. She walked with him into her home. In her arms she held a bundle close to her chest.

The man and woman seemed unaware of the net law enforcement cast around their home. As soon as they went inside, the net tightened—and the tension rose. The car looked right. The woman was blonde. And there was a newborn baby. But was it the right baby?

Randy Strong opened his car door and said, “We're going in” to Sheriff Espey. Then, he turned off his cell phone.

In Maryville, Espey struggled to breathe evenly. His mind raced through a catalogue of bad outcomes—a shootout, a hostage-taking, a baby who did not survive the event. He dwelled on the possibility that this lead, too, would be a total dead end—just an innocent couple caring for their own child. He stared at the phone, willing it to ring.

In Melvern, Strong—as instructed by Espey—was the first one at the door. Kevin Montgomery answered the knock and invited them all in. What was going through Kevin's mind as a herd of law enforcement stampeded into his home? Did he, at first, think it must have something to do with his wife's half-brothers, Tommy or Teddy, whom he knew had frequent brushes with the law? Whatever popped into Kevin's head, he was baffled by the intrusion into his home.

As Strong entered the house, he saw Lisa with a newborn baby in her arms. Next to her, he saw the blue glow of a television set. A notice of the Amber Alert for Bobbie Jo's baby scrolled across the bottom of the screen.

Strong asked, “Is that your new baby?”

“Yes,” she said. “You want to see it?” Lisa stretched out her arms and handed the baby to Strong. On Lisa's empty hands, a series of small, fresh cuts marked many of her fingers.

When questioned, Kevin related the call from Lisa in Topeka the afternoon before and his drive to pick up her and the baby and bring them both home.

Lisa explained her shopping trip to Topeka that was interrupted when her water broke. She told the officers about the delivery of her baby the day before at the Birth & Women's Center.

While the couple talked to Strong and FBI Special Agent Michael Miller, other members of law enforcement checked out their stories. They learned that no babies were born at the birthing center on December 16.

Since the authorities had all the necessary warrants in hand Strong was able to turn and walk out of the house—with the
baby girl still resting in his arms. He activated his cell phone and called Espey. “I have the baby in my hands.”

Tears welled in Espey's eyes. As he shared the news with the personnel in the building, the tears flowed—tears of joy for the baby, tears of bitterness for Bobbie Jo. Espey brushed his away and headed out to address the media. Before Espey said a word to the press gathered in Maryville, officers posted outside of the Montgomery home saw media representatives driving past the farmhouse.

Strong stepped off the porch and handed the baby to an agent from the Kansas Bureau of Investigation. The investigator got into his car and rushed the infant to Stormont-Vail Regional Health Center in Topeka for evaluation and DNA testing. Strong returned inside to continue the questioning of the couple in earnest.

Lisa sat with a placid expression plastered across her face as Strong advised her of her constitutional rights. Then he confronted her with the information they learned about the lack of births at the center the day before.

At first, Lisa maintained her original story and Kevin insisted that it all was a big mistake. Why are they hassling us? he wondered. What right do they have to take my baby? His heart raced as he worried that his life was tipping over and he would never be able to set it upright again.

Under the persistence of the questioning, Lisa gave up. Her face sagged, her shoulders slumped. She confessed to strangling Bobbie Jo and removing the fetus with a paring knife she found in Bobbie Jo's kitchen. She admitted that “Abigail” was the Stinnetts' baby—not hers—not Kevin's.

Only one person in the room was surprised—Kevin Montgomery. He felt like he was caught at a carnival on a manic Tilt-A-Whirl. He wanted off this nausea-inducing ride. He wanted to forget the tale his wife just told. It sickened him and confused him. It could not be true. He could not have married, lived with, slept with and trusted his own children to a woman who was capable of committing a crime this awful. This was not the Lisa he married. Not the woman he
promised to love, honor and cherish. This was not his life. This was not his world.

Most people who knew Lisa found Kevin's ignorance understandable. They also believed Lisa when she insisted that Kevin knew nothing. A clueless Kevin was a credible image. Lisa had been lying to people—and convincing them of the truth of her falsehoods—all of her life.

L
isa Marie Hedberg was born in Washington State on February 27, 1968. Her mother, Judy—born and raised in Kansas with six siblings—moved to the Northwest with her new husband when they got married. Lisa's father, John Hedberg, was a native of Washington and an army man.

When John's new assignment stationed him in Fort Riley, Kansas, the family relocated just west of Topeka. Known as “America's Warfighting Center,” Fort Riley had a reputation for excellent training of the armed forces personnel who passed through the base. Built of native limestone, the post's history extended back before the United States Civil War. Brevet Major General George A. Custer commanded the fort after the end of the war and up to the time he commenced his campaign on the high plains. The inconclusive foray resulted in Custer's court martial and one-year suspension from the Army after Custer returned to Fort Riley to see his wife without permission.

During World War II, 125,000 soldiers were trained at these facilities, including heavyweight boxing champion Joe Louis and movie stars like Mickey Rooney. It was still a vital training center with strong relations to the community that surrounded it when John and Judy arrived on base with their baby, Lisa. During the assignment at Fort Riley, their second child, Patty, was born on June 3, 1970.

Lisa was a smart little thing—learning to read by the time she was 4 years old. Reading became a passion for Lisa. She never had time to play with dolls like other little girls. All she wanted to do was read and learn. Her mother said that when her oldest daughter was engrossed in a book, “the house could burn down and she wouldn't even smell the smoke.”

The young girl was also obsessed with telling tall tales as the gospel truth. After her mother and father separated, she told everyone she met that her father died in Viet Nam.

After the dissolution of her first marriage, Judy was on her own with two young children. Her little family's standard of living sunk below the poverty level. It was then Judy met a single father of five, Jack Kleiner. He seemed a godsend. She moved with him and his family to Oklahoma.

On June 6, 1974, the number in the household increased by one with the birth of Lisa's first half-brother Teddy. The next year, Jerri was born on June 26, 1975.

In October of that year, Judy and Jack Kleiner were married. Their third and final child. Tommy, was born on April 6, 1978.

Though her lies made everyone in the family angry with her at one time or another, Lisa seemed to thrive. She continued her voracious reading and also learned to play the violin and French horn in grade school. In high school, she played the mellophone in the marching band, making first chair with ease. She acted in a class play and was active in the pep club and student council. She seemed to excel without any discernible effort, racking up A's and B's on her report card.

Beneath the surface of high performance, her mother saw the shadows of trouble to come. At times, Lisa seemed to switch from one personality to another. One moment, she was a sweet, caring child. The next, she was “the daughter of the devil itself.” At times, she said, she shrugged it all off as the normal strange phases a child went through growing up. At others, she was afraid of what the future held for her child.

People who knew both Lisa and Judy placed the blame squarely on Judy's doorstep. They said that all her life, Lisa heard her mother telling her that she wasn't good for anything. Judy did not provide Lisa—or any of her children—with any stability, or the security of a mother's unconditional love, one of Lisa's friends insisted.

Her treatment of her children was as mercurial as her moods. As adults, all of Judy's children said that getting along with Mom depended on which way the wind blew. Lisa, a friend said, learned to duck her head when the wind blew the wrong way.

In mid-February of 1983, one of the reasons for Lisa's inner turmoil became apparent to Judy. She came home and walked into a sight that sickened her. She saw her 15-year-old daughter engaged in sexual intercourse with her husband—the girl's stepfather.

Judy was stunned and terrified. Jack threatened to kill her if she told anyone. He was a violent man who had hit and knocked around her and the children for years. She believed he was capable of carrying through on his threat. “At first,” she said, “I kept my mouth shut. Then, I told a policeman and he took me to a lawyer.”

Even though the inappropriate sexual behavior was going on in her own home for quite some time, Judy claimed she was blind to it. Others argued that claim was a self-protective lie—Judy had known what Jack was doing for years; she simply placed her own well-being over that of her daughter.

Whether her denial of the abuse was subconscious or a deliberate act, when Judy saw it right before her eyes, she
could avoid the truth no longer. She confronted Jack, who did not deny it, but still did not express a shred of remorse.

“You can't rape the willing,” he said. It was the despicable but typical response of sexual child abusers everywhere. It's heard with sickening frequency on today's news—from the mouths of men like Jack and from female middle school teachers caught in sexual activity with their young adolescent students.

When Judy filed for divorce, Jack claimed in court that his estranged wife made the whole story up to get custody of their children. Judy took Lisa to counseling, but her daughter insisted that she never had sex with her stepfather. Judy had seen it with her own eyes. She knew her daughter was lying.

Lisa confided to others that she denied the abuse for one reason: Jack warned her that if she told anyone about their sexual encounters, he would go after Patty and do the same thing to her. Lisa said she kept her mouth shut to protect her younger sister.

In the summer of 1984, Judy was out on her own again—this time with five children to support and nurture. Jack was failing to make child support proponents and was jailed twice for it. Although the family was now on welfare, Judy said she tried to add an element of fun to their family life with inexpensive excursions—outings at the lake, fishing trips and driving out for ice cream.

Others painted a darker portrait of growing up with Judy. They said she never left one man unless she had another waiting in the wings, and that her children were always secondary to her pursuit of serial monogamy.

Early in 1986, Judy married again. Her third husband was Richard Boman. Richard's children were grown, but his son Carl returned home after a stint in the Navy. The 25-year-old Carl was intrigued by the bright 18-year-old girl now living in his father's house. He expressed his interest to Lisa and the two started dating.

Lisa graduated from high school in the spring of that year. She planned to join the Air Force to get money for college.
Then she learned she was pregnant. Her plans for furthering her education were abandoned. She and Carl married in August 1986, in Cleveland, Oklahoma.

Lisa was not the only child impacted by the tumultuous life with Judy and a series of stepfathers. Every one of Judy's children had a run-in with the law. Except for Lisa, all of them experimented to some extent with illegal drugs. For some reason, Lisa never attempted to escape from the realities of her life with an artificial high. Patty now claimed she was the only one of Judy's children to never spend a night in jail.

Judy did not provide them with a good template for healthy relationships, and that was demonstrated in the way they interacted with each other. They were fierce in the defense of a sibling when anyone outside the family launched an attack. Within their circle, however, they were ruthless. They never hesitated to step on one of their own in a series of never-ending power plays.

Each of the kids had reasons for resenting Judy. All grew up and moved away. Yet, somehow, they all found themselves drawn back to her side—compelled to be near her to perpetuate the warped family equation.

L
isa entered her marriage to Carl in 1986 torn between emulating the mother she loved and pushing away from the mom she resented. She longed for normalcy, stability and security, and yet she still followed her mother's path.

In less than four years, Lisa had three daughters and a son. Desiree Nichole was born in 1987, Chelsea Lynne in 1988, Carl James Boman II—who everyone called C.J.—in 1989 and Kayla Deanna in 1990. After the birth of the fourth child, Lisa underwent a tubal ligation procedure under pressure from her husband to ensure that baby was her last. This frenzied bout of procreation foreshadowed the desperation that would possess Lisa once she was unable to have any more children. As long as she stayed pregnant, she felt confident that Carl would not leave no matter how serious their marital problems became.