PURCELL, Okla. —  A judge formally sentenced a former grocery store stocker to death by injection Thursday for killing a 10-year-old girl in a bizarre cannibalistic fantasy.

McClain County District Judge Candace Blalock approved the death sentence recommended by a jury that convicted Kevin Ray Underwood of first-degree murder last month for the death of his neighbor Jamie Rose Bolin.

Underwood, 28, showed no emotion when judge handed down the sentence.

During his trial, prosecutors played a videotaped confession in which Underwood told investigators he lured the girl into his Purcell apartment on April 12, 2006, beat her over the head with a cutting board, suffocated her, sexually assaulted her and then tried to cut off her head with a decorative dagger.

Underwood told authorities he was fueled by sexual fantasies that involved torturing, raping, killing and eating his victim, although no evidence was presented that he cannibalized the girl's body.

Underwood's attorneys did not dispute that he killed the girl, and it took jurors less than an hour to find him guilty. His attorneys argued, however, that Underwood's life should be spared because he suffered from mental illness that could be helped with medication.

Defense attorneys also said Underwood was bullied as a child and suffered emotional and verbal abuse from his parents.

Jamie lived with her father in an apartment upstairs from Underwood, and her disappearance prompted a statewide search for the girl. Underwood raised the suspicions of officers at a police checkpoint and he let them search his apartment, where they discovered the child's nude body stuffed inside a plastic tub in his bedroom closet.

NORMAN, Okla. —  A jury found a man guilty of first-degree murder Friday in the killing of a 10-year-old girl, reaching its decision within minutes the day after hearing his macabre videotaped confession.

Kevin Underwood, a former grocery stocker who claimed Internet pornography stoked his cannibalistic fantasies, showed no emotion as the verdict was announced. Family members of the victim, Jamie Rose Bolin, patted each other and shook hands.

The girl's body was found in a plastic tub in Underwood's apartment in April 2006. Jurors had heard his detailed videotaped confession in court Thursday.

Judge Candace Blalock told jurors to return to court Monday morning for the penalty phase. Prosecutors have said they intend to seek the death penalty, while the defense has said it will seek to spare his life.

Deputies led Underwood, 28, away in handcuffs once jurors had left the courtroom.

Rose Fox, Jamie's grandmother, said after the verdict that she was originally against the death penalty in the case, but has now changed her mind.

"He made his choice," Fox said. "He's a monster in human form."

"I was for mercy. And then when I found out what he really did to her ... . He showed her no mercy."

Jurors began deliberating following closing arguments in which Cleveland County District Attorney Greg Mashburn predicted it would take jurors longer to pick a foreman than to determine guilt.

"It's the worst of the worst," Mashburn said. "His plan is to butcher someone like an animal."

In his closing argument, Defense attorney Matthew Haire did not dispute Underwood's guilt. But he called him "a lonely, very troubled, reclusive young man" and accused prosecutors of overwhelming jurors with gruesome evidence.

In the confession, Underwood said he lured the girl, his upstairs neighbor, into his apartment in Purcell, hit her with a cutting board, smothered her with his hands, sexually assaulted the body and nearly cut her head off as part of a fantasy involving cannibalism.

"I wanted to know what it tasted like, and just the thought of eating someone was appealing to me," Underwood said in the confession.

Underwood also said such fantasies began about the time he started taking the antidepressant Lexapro. Defense attorneys plan to call witnesses during the penalty phase on his use of the drug.

Report details cannibalism talk

By Chad Previch - NewsOk.com

June 27, 2007

PURCELL — Kevin Ray Underwood, the 27-year-old loner accused of killing a 10-year-old girl last year, had philosophical discussions of cannibalism, made comments about killing people and had a Barbie doll with nails through its eyes, according to new court documents.

His attorneys and prosecutors met in court Tuesday to discuss sharing evidence with each other.

The two sides bickered in McClain County District Court for about an hour, accusing each other of withholding evidence. Underwood appeared in court wearing an orange jail suit with handcuffs around his wrists. He appeared more engaged in the proceedings than in the past. He talked to his attorneys before, during and after the hearing.

At times he stared outside a nearby window toward some trees. Underwood is charged with first-degree murder and faces a possible death penalty in the killing of Jamie Rose Bolin, who died in April 2006.

She was found dead, stuffed inside a storage tub in Underwood's closest.

Police say Underwood, who was a neighbor of Jamie and her father, had plans to consume her body.

District Judge Candace Blalock has set a trial date for Aug. 13.

Intense media coverage prompted Blalock to move the trial from Purcell to Norman.

A gag order has been placed on all parties.

According to the prosecution's witness summary report, Underwood talked to a childhood friend about cannibalism and was taking medications to control anxiety in 2005 and 2006.

He also talked to a worker at a SuperCuts in Oklahoma City about cooking organs, according to the documents, and was nicknamed "Zombie Kevin” by co-workers at a grocery store.

Another co-worker from a fast-food restaurant will testify that Underwood was a "little creepy” and was interested in serial killers.

Yet another will testify that Underwood made sick jokes and said, "I'm gonna snap and kill someone,” and had a weird laugh.

Another told prosecutors that Underwood's video game fixation affected him negatively.

In other court documents, Jamie's relatives wrote about being on medication and having nightmares because of the death.

"There will be too much money left at Christmas and too few presents under the tree,” grandmother Rose Fox wrote. "Easter will have one less basket to make; Thanksgiving, too much turkey left over and not eaten; in August, one birthday cake and party will be unneeded.”

Computer reveals disturbing aspects

Two months before the killing, Underwood messaged a friend online that he wanted to write a children's book that included anal sex.

Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation agents also found pictures of autopsies of women on his computer.

Other potential prosecution witnesses include Underwood's mother and father.

Larry Ray Underwood will testify to not being at his son's apartment in more than a year, and his mother, Connie Underwood, will testify about her son's social anxiety history and that he told her he will have to "move away from Purcell” when he gets out of jail.

Underwood was stopped by authorities at a checkpoint a couple days after Jamie's disappearance. He then led investigators to a closet.

When an FBI agent observed a tub inside the closet, Underwood said, "Go ahead and arrest me.

She is in there. I chopped her up.” Shortly after that arrest, according to newly released documents, he also confessed to Dustin Stokesberry, an inmate trusty at the McClain County jail.

He told the trustee that he "started to” but did not finish cutting up Jamie. Stokesberry has a drug and burglary record.

In court papers filed Monday, prosecutors said the death penalty is warranted because the crime was to avoid prosecution, it was heinous and Underwood is a continued threat to society.

They say Underwood struck Jamie with a cutting board three to four times and then placed his hand over her mouth and nose until she died.

Jamie yelled, "I am sorry,” and "Oh God, I'm sorry,” during the attack.

Records show he told FBI agents that he sexually assaulted the young girl after killing her. Underwood told the FBI about his fantasies of making a child watch porn and have sex with him.

He also told them about wanting to stick skewers through her cheeks and needles
in her eyes, according to the bill of particulars.

Jamie vomited and choked during the attack, the bill states.

'I'm going to burn in hell,' suspect says

By Anthony Thornton - NewsOk.com

August 23, 2006

PURCELL - Moments after confessing to the grisly murder of a 10-year-old neighbor, Kevin Ray Underwood confided to an FBI agent, "I'm going to burn in hell," the agent testified Tuesday.

Craig Overby was the only witness to testify at Underwood's 90-minute preliminary hearing. Afterward, McClain County Special Judge Gary Barger ordered Underwood to face trial in the April slaying of Jamie Rose Bolin.

Underwood, 26, will remain in the McClain County jail until his Sept. 20 formal arraignment.

District Attorney Tim Kuykendall is seeking the death penalty, but he lost his re-election bid last month. His successor, Greg Mashburn, has said he supports the death penalty but hasn't decided whether to continue seeking it in this case.

Underwood's attorneys have not sought a change in venue or a mental competency exam in the case.

Underwood entered court in orange jail coveralls and handcuffs, but no leg shackles.

Underwood's parents and sister sat behind him on the front row of the courtroom gallery, a few feet away from five of Jamie's relatives. The victim's family members have said repeatedly they don't blame Underwood's family.

Security was tight, however. According to a Purcell police supervisor's count, the courthouse contained 12 police officers, six McClain County sheriff's deputies and four armed district attorney's investigators.

Sheriff Don Hewett said he also borrowed a metal detector from the University of Oklahoma for the hearing.

The extra security measures were partially motivated by an incident at Underwood's initial court appearance in April, when a man with no connection to the case tried to rush the courtroom, yelling that Underwood was a "baby killer."

Interview and arrest described

Overby testified he stopped a red pickup driven by Underwood's father about 3:45 p.m. April 14, two days after Jamie disappeared from the second-floor apartment she shared with her father. Underwood lived downstairs and across a breezeway.

The pickup, which also contained Kevin Underwood, was the second vehicle stopped at a Purcell intersection after Overby and state troopers set up one of several checkpoints throughout town.

Brief conversations there and in Overby's FBI car led him to question Underwood further -- without the father present -- at the Purcell police headquarters.

Underwood had confirmed reports from two of Jamie's other neighbors that he was the last person to see her. That made him a person of interest, but not yet a suspect, Overby testified.

After a 45-minute interview, Underwood agreed to a search of his apartment, Overby said.

He said Underwood remained calm until moments after Overby saw a plastic storage tub, sealed with duct tape, in his bedroom closet. Underwood explained that the tub was sealed to keep moisture from damaging the comic books inside.

When Overby opened a corner of the tub, he saw a blue, strapless shirt. Underwood had told him that Jamie was wearing such a shirt when he last saw her.

Overby said he told Underwood, who was standing nearby, "There's no comics in here. There is clothing."

At that point, Underwood said, "Go ahead and arrest me," Overby testified.

"Where is she?" Overby said he asked Underwood.

"I hit her and chopped her up," was Underwood's reply, the agent testified.

However, an autopsy showed her throat had been cut from ear to ear, but otherwise her nude body was intact. The autopsy report said Jamie probably died of a lack of oxygen.

Court records allege that Underwood told investigators he hit the girl on the head with a cutting board, then smothered her with his hand and duct tape.

Investigators think Jamie was killed shortly after she entered Underwood's apartment.

Investigators have said Underwood told them he raped Jamie's corpse. The autopsy report said there was evidence of sexual assault, but that the medical examiner couldn't tell whether it occurred after death.

'He's a demon'

Just before leaving Apartment 115, perhaps for the last time, Underwood began hyperventilating and said, "I'm going to burn in hell," Overby testified.

Overby and another FBI agent were concerned about Underwood's safety -- and their own -- because nearly 20 members of Jamie's family were holding vigil outside his apartment window.

He said the agents calmed Underwood and led him outside, without handcuffs, and put him in the front seat of an FBI car.

"That was the safest thing they could have done," Jamie's aunt Linda Chiles said after the hearing. "We would have kicked his butt" if the family had known at the time that Underwood had confessed.

Tuesday's brief hearing spared Jamie's relatives from hearing the most gruesome aspects of her death.

They said it was the first time they had heard of the alleged "burn in hell" comment.

"I've always said it's where he should go," uncle Mark Chiles said. "There's evil in this world. He's a demon and needs to go right back to where he belongs."