Source: Karen Bleier / Getty
Three women have been charged in connection with the death of an Alabama grandmother. Apparently the women beat the woman for several days in an attempt to get access to her boyfriend’s EBT card…
A 911 call over screams heard inside of a mobile home in Birmingham led to the discovery of Miranda Michelle Lynch’s battered body on a bathroom floor Friday, according to the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office.
The 34-year-old woman’s housemate, Karen Kirby, 57, was the only one found with her body. But it wasn’t long before authorities say Kirby’s daughter and a friend were collared in the monstrous crime too.
Kirby, her daughter Susan Otts, 39, and Tamara Giarrusso, 43, were later arrested and charged with kidnapping and capital murder for the heinous attack that was described by one deputy as “driven by pure greed.”
“I didn’t think this story could get any worse but obviously as we have learned, it can and it did,” Chief Deputy Randy Christian told AL.com.
Authorities say Lynch’s murder was the result of the women’s plot to steal her boyfriend’s Electronic Benefits Card (EBT) — a government-issued debit card that replaced food stamps — after he became critically injured in an Aug. 5 car crash.
Her boyfriend, who wasn’t named by authorities but was described as living with Kirby and Lynch, was driving Kirby’s car to pick up his EBT card when he crashed head-on into a tractor-trailer, leaving him hospitalized into this week, AL.com reported.
Believing he may die, the women conspired to steal his card by making a duplicate copy but to do that they’d need his private information, such as his social security number.
When Lynch allegedly refused to hand that information over, authorities say she was held against her will and regularly beaten until dead.
“It is so sad to think about what this poor woman had to go through at the hands of these three,” Christian said. “They will be held accountable for it.”
The three accused killers are being held without bond.
