A Southeast Texas man accused of murdering his girlfriend in a Baytown triple slaying told detectives he killed "not the real Kirsten but the fake Kirsten," according to court documents filed in Galveston County.
Kirsten Fritch, 16, was stabbed more than 50 times before being left in a wooded area in Texas City, records show.
Jesse Dobbs - a 21-year-old Livingston man with a history of domestic violence - is facing a murder charge and is considered a suspect in the slaying of Fritch's mother and sister in their home.
When police interviewed the accused man, he brazenly admitted to one of the killings, according to court records.
"Kirsten is dead; I killed her," he t old investigators.
The tragedy began to unfold in the early hours of Nov. 8. Around 2 a.m., a neighbor heard gunshots in the area of a home on Louise Street in Baytown, where Fritch lived with her mother, Cynthia Morris, 37, and sister, Breanna Pavilicek, 13.
When law enforcement went to the home, they found the bodies of Morris and her younger daughter shot to death in the master bedroom.
Hours later, authorities put out an Amber Alert for Kirsten, who'd gone missing along with her boyfriend and the family car.
Around 10:30 a.m., a man spotted the couple in his Texas City apartment complex when Dobbs asked him for a cigarette.
Around 8:30 p.m., Dobbs called an ex-girlfriend and asked her to take him to Louisiana so he could see his kids one last time, according to court records.
Friend: 'It's a relief'
The woman called police, who found the phone number matched Shenanigan's bar in Texas City.
Initially, authorities picked him up at the bar - wet and shoeless - and held him on a resisting arrest charge.
Police found the missing car at the apartment complex across the street.
Although Dobbs allegedly confessed when investigators showed up at the Texas City jail to question him, he apparently didn't offer information as to Kirsten's whereabouts.
After a two-day search, a rescue team found Kirsten's body in a field, 200 yards from Shenanigan's and 400 yards from the complex where Dobbs had asked for a cigarette.
The girl had 53 to 60 stab wounds covering her face, neck and torso, as well as possible defensive wounds on her arms, the medical examiner concluded.
The autopsy also found that the likely murder weapon was a single-edge blade.
A search and recovery team found a backpack Saturday hidden under water in a drainage ditch near where Kirsten's body was found.
Inside was a journal bearing Kirsten's name, and a single-blade knife wrapped in clothes detectives believe belonged to the teen.
On Tuesday, Dobbs was charged with murder and held on $500,000 bond.
"People are relieved, because that's the first thing you want to happen. It's a relief," said longtime family friend Audri-Annie Sweatt.
Motive still unknown
Assistant District Attorney Bill Reed said the Galveston County case does not have the elements for a capital murder charge, which generally requires a murder during the commission of another offense.
But if Dobbs is charged in murders of the mother and sister, which occurred in Harris County, it could become a death penalty case, Reed added.
Police did not release any information as to a possible motive.
Just months before the killing, Dobbs was charged in a domestic violence case in Polk County, about 70 miles north of Baytown.
In May, he was convicted of the Class A misdemeanor and accepted a sentence of just over a month in jail.
In 2015, he agreed to a two-month sentence for another Class A misdemeanor, hindering a secured creditor.
A memorial service for Kirsten is scheduled for Thursday at Earthman Baytown Funeral Home, from 2 p.m. to 8 p.m.
A funeral is slated for Friday afternoon at Second Baptist Church.