Shepherd: I 'would boil someone and eat them'

This morning, the Chronicle has more details from the Tynesha Stewart murder case — and if you thought the story couldn't have been more gruesome, think again. According to witness statements used in a search warrant request for confessed killer Timothy Wayne Shepherd's apartment, Shepherd once said that he "would boil someone and eat them." That hits pretty close to home, considering that police say Shepherd destroyed Stewart's dismembered body parts on barbecue grills. So far, there's no indication that he actually ate the remains, but that kind of talk probably won't help Shepherd's defense.

Also from the search warrant request is some information about the timeline of Stewart's murder: Shepherd told investigators he picked Stewart — his ex-girlfriend and a 19-year-old Texas A&M student — up from a friend's house around 4 a.m. March 15, the day she disappeared. The two of them went to Shepherd's apartment in the 17700 block of Red Oak in Spring, where the two got into an argument and Shepherd choked Stewart. According to the affidavit, Shepherd said that "blood was coming from the complainant's mouth. The defendant stated that he took her into the bathroom, took her clothes off and cleaned her up." The next evening, a neighbor called 911 to report that smoke was billowing from Shepherd's patio, so firefighters checked out Shepherd's apartment and found "what appeared to be ribs" in the bathtub, "meat that was mostly charred" wrapped in foil and "meat floating in water." Shepherd had told a neighbor that he was cooking a lot of meat for a wedding; it's not clear how he explained the situation to the firefighters, but they left him alone.

Among the 100 items investigators took from Shepherd's apartment during a search earlier this week were pieces of bone, hair, "charred items," DNA samples, a garbage disposal, a sink plunger, an empty ammonia bottle and some painting materials. Harris County sheriff's Sgt. Dana Wolfe said the sheriff's department won't comment on the search because it might jeopardize their case.