Parker County teen held in slayings of mother and sister

By Domingo Ramirez Jr. and Bill Miller wmiller@star-telegram.com

ramirez@star-telegram.com,

ANNETTA SOUTH -- A 17-year-old former Aledo High School student picked up the phone early Thursday and calmly told a 911 operator that he had fatally shot his mother and younger sister.

"I felt like they were just suffocating me, in a way," Jake Evans said. "Obviously, you know, I'm pretty, I guess, evil."

The 911 recording was released by the Parker County Sheriff's Department later Thursday during the investigation into the deaths of Evans' mother and 15-year-old sister, whose bodies were found inside their home in the 150 block of River Creek Lane.

After receiving Jake Evans' call shortly before 12:30 a.m., five sheriff's deputies headed for the house inside a gated community just south of Aledo.

When they pulled up, Jake Evans was standing outside the front door with his hands in the air. While one deputy handcuffed him and put him in the back of a patrol car, the others went inside, according to an arrest warrant affidavit.

They found Jami Evans, 48, in an office area near the back of the home. She had been shot multiple times.

The sister, Mallory Evans, had been shot once on a stairway and then several times near the home's entrance, Sheriff Larry Fowler said.

The father was in Washington, D.C., on business, and two older sisters were not at the house.

Jake Evans was taken to the Parker County Jail in Weatherford and was interviewed for several hours, Fowler said.

He faces a capital murder charge because two people were killed.

"I have my suspicions, but there's nothing I can say precisely as a motive," Fowler said. "It's certainly a mystery."

Investigators reported that Evans evidently acted alone. He told deputies that he used a .22-caliber revolver, Fowler said.

"He had taken the weapon from his grandfather," Fowler said. "His grandfather had no knowledge that he had it."

'I wasn't even angry'

In the recording of Evans' 911 call, an operator can be heard asking him to describe his emergency.

"Uh," he said evenly, "I just killed my mom and my sister."

"What?" the operator said, alarmed.

She quickly regained control and got his name, age, address and the location of the gun he used.

She also asked why he attacked his family.

"It's weird," he said. "I wasn't even angry with them. It just kind of happened. I've been kind of planning on killing for a while now."

"The two of them?" the operator asked. "Or just anybody?"

"Pretty much just anybody."

Emotion can be heard growing in the teen's even tone as he described the killings.

"This is really going to mess me up in the future," he said, "but you see, my sister, I told my sister that my mom needed her. She was in her room and she came out of her room and, uh, I, I shot her. And she rolled down the stairs and I shot her again. And then I went down and I shot my mom about maybe three or four times.

"I'll never forget this, but my, uh, sister, she came down the stairs and she was screaming and I was telling her that I'm sorry but that this, hold still, that, you know, I was just going to just make it go away, you know. But she just kept on freaking out.

"But finally she fell down and I shot her in the head probably three times."

Later, Evans said: "I just thought it would be quick, you know? I didn't want them to feel any pain. That's why I used a gun. But it's like everything went wrong."

The operator, who encouraged the teen to take deep breaths, asked whether he wanted to hurt himself.

"Um, I don't know," he said. "I'm a little freaked out about guns now. I definitely, you know, I assure you, I definitely don't like myself, you know? But I'm just so freaked out by guns now. Just to let you know, I hate the feeling of killing someone. I, you know, I'm going to be messed up."

The operator assured him that the deputies who were on the way wanted to help him and wouldn't hurt him.

"I understand if you all want to, you know?" he said.

Later, Evans said he was worried about nightmares and asked whether medication could prevent them.

"I don't mean to sound like a wimp or anything," he said, "but this is -- wow. I've never done anything violent in my whole life, you know?"

A stunning tragedy

Evans and his sister were being home-schooled after withdrawing from Aledo schools, Superintendent Dan Manning said.

Jacob Evans left Aledo High in January, during his sophomore year, according to school records. He played football in middle school and was on the high school golf team, school officials said.

Mallory withdrew from McAnally Intermediate in January 2010, according to school records.

"It's a terrible tragedy," Manning said. "We have teams of counselors at the school for students and faculty."

Jami Evans worked in the Aledo district as an elementary school teacher and assistant principal for 15 years. She taught first grade at Coder Elementary and Stuard Elementary from 1989 until 2004, according to school records.

"Her dedication to her students and her love of learning was an inspiration to all who knew her," the district said in a statement released late Thursday.

Neighbors were stunned.

"It's very quiet here," said Karen Miller, who lives in a subdivision across the road from the Evans family home. "You see quarter horses and donkeys in pastures. You don't expect something like a killing to happen."

Domingo Ramirez Jr.

817-390-7763

Twitter: @mingoramirezjr

Looking for comments?