Steve Carrington, who confessed in December to the brutal killing of his 12-year-old stepdaughter, finally has been indicted for her murder.
| Steven Carrington |
A Fort Bend County grand jury returned the murder indictment Aug. 7, and also indicted Carrington on a charge of aggravated sexual assault – a first-degree felony because the victim was a child under 14 years of age.
However, Assistant Fort Bend County District Attorney Michael Hartman said Wednesday, the sexual assault charge was not related to Carrington’s murdered stepdaughter, Teketria Buggs, but another child. According to the indictment, the assault occured on or about Aug. 1, 2005.
The Buggs girl was was last seen alive the night of Dec. 2, 2005, sleeping in her family’s home in rural Fort Bend County near the community of Orchard.
Carrington, 31, who shared that home with Teketria, her mother, and several members of her extended family, was placed under arrest a few days later, during an investigation into the girl’s disappearance, when it was learned he had an outstanding warrant for failure to appear in court on an assault charge.
| Teketria Buggs |
On Dec. 15, ending a massive search for the girl, Teketria Buggs’ body was discovered in the Brazos River, within three miles of her Orchard home.
The next day, Carrington admitted to Fort Bend County and Texas Rangers investigators that he had committed a murder in 1988, that of Corey Brooks. Brooks, 21 at the time of his death, had lived on Johnson Road about a mile east of Orchard – the same property where Teketria Buggs lived until her murder.
Carrington finally confessed to Teketria Buggs’ murder a few hours after her Dec. 23 funeral in Richmond.
Hartman said Carrington has remained in Fort Bend County Jail in Richmond since December, under indictment for Brooks’ murder.
The county had been waiting for DNA test results before pursuing the Buggs murder indictment, Hartman said. However, the Dallas-area lab that has the DNA evidence has run into a series of delays, and prosecutors felt it was time to proceed.
Hartman said the sexual assault charge carries the same range of punishments as the two murder charges Carrington faces. And because all three offenses are alleged to have occurred at different times, it’s possible that, if convicted, Carrington would have to serve the sentences consecutively.
