6 years ago
The Rev. Harold Hamon refrained from directly discussing the death of his neighbor, Bobbie Jo Stinnett, whose baby was cut from her womb after she had been strangled.
Instead, the subject of this week's sermon was forgiveness.
Churchgoers in two communities grieved Sunday for the young woman and struggled to understand the horrific slaying.
"It's almost unbelievable that right under your nose something terrible can be happening," said Hamon, who lives in the small town of Skidmore in northwestern Missouri.
Hamon said he was probably addressing Christmas cards when Stinnett, 23, was killed. A short time later, a member of his congregation called to say she had heard an ambulance and wondered if anyone near the church was hurt. Hamon said he looked out the window and saw police cars parked in front of Stinnett's house.
Authorities said Lisa Montgomery, of Melvern, Kan., confessed to strangling Stinnett, cutting out the fetus and taking the baby back to Kansas. She is accused of trying to pass the child off as her own to family and friends. The baby girl was later recovered unharmed.
Montgomery, 36, is expected to appear in court Monday. She remained held at a detention center in Kansas City, Kan., but it was unclear whether she will be arraigned in Kansas or Missouri.
The Rev. Mike Wheatly, pastor of First Church of God in Melvern, said he wrote his sermon about the birth of Jesus before details about Stinnett's death surfaced.
Titled, "A Baby Changed Everything," it had added relevance.
"You could've put the situation of Bobbie Jo Stinnett in the same sermon because they are both special babies," he said.
Hamon married Bobbie Jo and Zeb Stinnett last year at his Skidmore Christian Church.
"They were kids in the neighborhood, nice young kids," Hamon said. "She's just a real nice girl, real pretty, quiet and reserved."
Stinnett's mother found her body in a pool of blood inside the couple's small white home on Thursday afternoon. Stinnett had been eight months pregnant with the couple's first child.
Police recovered Stinnett's baby a day later after tracking down Montgomery through e-mails she had sent Stinnett about buying a dog.
Montgomery, a mother of two, lied to family and friends about being pregnant with twins and suffering a miscarriage, investigators said. Detectives doubt whether she was pregnant at all.
She met her husband at a Topeka fast-food restaurant with Stinnett's baby, telling him she had gone into labor while shopping in the city, authorities said.
Montgomery's husband has not been charged.
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