Fort Worth police traffic investigators and homicide detectives are still working to determine how a 27-year-old woman and 13-month-old girl ended up dead in a south Fort Worth field.[[288447331,L]]
The bodies of Lindsay Groce and her daughter, Hailey Gardner, were discovered near a crashed sedan along Altamesa Boulevard, just west of Bryant Irvin Road.
Late Wednesday, police said the woman and child were found unclothed in a field, with their clothes nearby. The two had no apparent injuries that would suggest how they died.
Investigators are waiting on the Tarrant County Medical Examiner’s office to determine a cause of death, following autopsies.
However, the two were connected to the crashed car that was first spotted around 8:20 a.m. on Tuesday morning by a passing motorist. The bodies weren’t found until a few hours later.
On Wednesday morning, two Fort Worth police officers were seen talking to a gas well employee who was checking the property. Along the crime scene, pink spray paint marks indicated where the vehicle hit barbed wire fences and a road barrier. Dented posts were strewed about the ground and a side view mirror was visible in a pasture. They offer clues but no hard answers.
Residents in the area want those answers just as badly as investigators.
“It’s perplexing, the fact the bodies were away from the car, you think they would have been in the car,” said Linda Fuqua, as she exited the nearby post office. But now I’m wondering, what happened. Was she trying to get away or help herself from the accident with her child?”
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Many other residents also expressed sadness at the crash, especially since so many people drive by the area and hadn’t noticed any problem until police and media showed up on Tuesday afternoon.
“It’s very sad, I feel for the family and I hope they're all going to be all right,” Fuqua said.
Investigators are now working to try and determine when the crash happened. Altamesa turns into Dirks Road and isn’t very well lit. A few houses border the roadway, but none appear to have surveillance cameras.
