TBO.com
Published: May 5, 2009
Updated: 03:42 pm
TAMPA - The mother of an infant thrown from a car onto the side of Interstate 275 early this morning had been frightened for months of the man charged today with murdering the boy.
Jasmine Bedwell, 17, started dating Richard McTear Jr. about 10 months ago, when she was pregnant with the child of another man, a man in prison. From the beginning, McTear did not warm up to the boy, said the infant's great aunt Roberta Thomas. Bedwell told Thomas she was frightened of McTear and feared for her boy's safety.
"She was always scared of him," Thomas said. "He didn't care for the child."
Last month, Bedwell sought an injunction against McTear for domestic violence. She didn't appear in court Monday, and the case was dropped. Thomas was trying to help Bedwell navigate that legal system to keep her and her son Emanuel Wesley Murray safe, she said.
But before any of that happened, Bedwell's fears came true.
Early today, Hillsborough County sheriff's deputies say, McTear battered Bedwell and threw Emanuel on concrete, kidnapped the infant and threw him onto the shoulder of southbound Interstate 275, just south of Fowler Avenue.
He has been charged with first-degree murder, aggravated child abuse, kidnapping, felony battery and burglary with battery.
Jason Bird was driving to work some time about 4 a.m. today when he saw what he thought was trash on the side of the interstate. The more he thought about it, the more he realized it wasn't trash. He had seen the eyes of a child.
"It flipped me out, and I started shaking and said, 'It's a doll, a baby doll,' " Bird said.
It wasn't. It was the 3-month-old boy, who was pronounced dead about 4:30 a.m.
Questions to the medical examiner's office about the autopsy were referred to Hillsborough deputies. Hillsborough County Sheriff's spokeswoman Debbie Carter said those details won't be available until a final autopsy report is released.
After searching for McTear, investigators got a call from the Robles Park public housing complex and arrested the 21-year-old McTear just after 9 a.m., after a short foot chase. As he was led from a patrol car at the sheriff's District 2 headquarters, the handcuffed McTear was asked about the crime.
"It's a dirty game," McTear said after cursing the media. "It's a dirty game."
Investigators found McTear's Chevrolet Impala about 5 a.m. at his home, 1601 E. River Cove St. Four hours later, police got a tip from a caller who had seen news coverage on the incident and said McTear might be hiding in the Robles Park area. Officers went to 229 Stratford Ave. McTear ran out a door, and the short chase began, Carter said. Deputies found McTear hiding in a backyard at 3803 Arlington Ave.
McTear didn't resist when he was caught, Carter said, but he didn't say anything to them.
Lillie Bedwell, Jasmine's Bedwell's mother, said her daughter has been treated and released from a hospital.
Asked if she could describe what the day had been like for her, Lillie Bedwell said, "Hell." She said she didn't know McTear. Asked if her daughter had mentioned what had happened, Lillie Bedwell said, "She can hardly talk."
The Hillsborough County School District said Bedwell last attended Adams Middle School in 2005-06. Lillie Bedwell said her daughter has been working on getting her GED.
McTear's criminal history includes dozens of arrests, several of which involved domestic violence, Tampa police spokeswoman Andrea Davis said. His first arrest on domestic violence charges came when he was 14, Davis said. Details on that case are unavailable because he was a juvenile.
In 2007, McTear avoided prosecution on felony criminal domestic battery by strangulation charges when the victim waived prosecution. That case didn't involve Bedwell. In that incident, police said, he beat his girlfriend up, stole her car with their 3-year-old child in the back seat, gave the child back and burned the car,
Sheriff's Maj. Harold Winsett said the infant's death was tragic. The veteran investigator said it is hard to put into words how or why someone would hurt an innocent child.
"You never get used to this type of a case," he said. "You never get used to this type of a crime."
Elizabeth Fuelner, who lives two doors east of McTear's home, said she didn't know him but the police were at McTear's place a lot.
Debra Cohen, who lives nearby, said she was awakened this morning by the sound of a police helicopter.
"They do their thing. Nobody messes with them," she said of the people at McTear's home. "There's always a lot of people on their porch. Every weekend there are parties and a lot of fighting."
Thomas, the child's great aunt from St. Petersburg, said the boy's incarcerated father is devastated and hopes to get a furlough to attend the funeral services.
He's "not doing good," she said.
As for Jasmine Bedwell, Thomas said the teenager was a good mother who always tried to do right by her only son.
"She was trying to be the best mom she could," Thomas said of Bidwell, "If you saw her, you saw her son with her."
In the injunction Bedwell had sought against McTear, she claimed he had violent tendencies, was armed and dangerous and had a drug problem, court records show. In a document, she said McTear had wanted to get his things last month, she refused and called deputies. Deputies arrived, but after they left, he entered the apartment complex on North 15th Street, got out of his vehicle, forced his way into her home and beat her, she said.
Talking about McTear is difficult for Thomas.
"He should get what he did to that baby," she said. "How could you hurt a baby? That's the devil's work.
Especially when they have children involved! 
