12:24 PM CDT on Tuesday, October 12, 2004

By TANYA EISERER, MICHAEL GRABELL and MICHAEL E. YOUNG / The Dallas Morning News

The young girl accused of shooting and killing her sleeping mother early Sunday carefully planned the crime, Dallas police say, and apparently brought friends to see the body before allowing her little brother to call 911.

"She's not your average 12-year-old," said Sgt. Gary Kirkpatrick of the homicide unit.

But then, her life was far from typical.

The girl, whose name has not been released because of her age, has been charged with murder and was being held at Henry Wade Juvenile Justice Center.

Her 10-year-old brother's call to police about 1 a.m. Sunday came only after the girl's plan played out, several neighbors said.

One, a 15-year-old friend whose name is being withheld because his parents couldn't be contacted, saw the girl minutes after the shooting.

"She came down the street crying," he said. "She said [her mother] had hit her in the head and that she shot her mom while she was in bed.

"She's not a bad person, not around me," the boy said. "She didn't say nothing about planning to do this, but she said her mom would hit her."

An acquaintance, who did not want her name used because she feared for her safety, said the 15-year-old said the girl took him back to her house – a converted one-car garage – to see 48-year-old Elvira Marion Walton's body. She'd been shot below the left eye, the boy told her, a fact police confirmed. The weapon was a rifle the family kept for protection.

Elvira Marion Walton

"After she shot her, she packed her and her brother's clothes," said the acquaintance, a woman who added that the girl woke her younger brother and led him to a friend's house nearby.

Police couldn't confirm that the girl returned to the murder scene, but, "We're definitely considering that possibility," Sgt. Kirkpatrick said.

Sneaking out of house

The woman said Ms. Walton had constant problems with her daughter sneaking from the house to visit her boyfriend.

"She liked the older boys," the woman said of the 12-year-old. "She would always sneak out of the house to go down there."

She added that she didn't believe Ms. Walton abused her daughter. She remembered that Ms. Walton was mad at one of her older daughters who suggested that she'd come by and spank her sister for skipping school.

The 12-year-old "was getting out of hand, doing what she wanted to do," the woman said, while Ms. Walton "seemed like a loving mother to me."

Police also questioned the girl's story of being hit hard enough to lose consciousness.

"There were no visible marks or indications of abuse," Sgt. Kirkpatrick said.

But there's no doubt the girl grew up in a troubled home.

Records from Ms. Walton's divorce case with the girl's father, Robert Walton, depict a stormy marriage marked by allegations of abuse, adultery and child molestation. That divorce was pending when Ms. Walton died.

Ms. Walton's daughter from an earlier relationship signed an affidavit in February 2001 stating that Mr. Walton sexually assaulted her when she was "5 or 6." She never told her mother, she said, because she was afraid.

Ms. Walton accused her husband of assaulting her once or twice a week and said he had had numerous affairs with men since the couple's marriage in July 1984 after they met a few years earlier while he was serving in the U.S. Army in Germany. She said he threatened to send her back to Germany if she told police.

Ms. Walton had said her husband had been hospitalized for bipolar disorder, which he confirmed.

Mr. Walton, now living as a transsexual, acknowledged Monday that he had had extramarital affairs with men while married but said his wife had had affairs, too. He said Ms. Walton was working as a prostitute when they met.

The pair separated in January 1998, and in August 2000, Mr. Walton took their daughter and son – he says with permission from police – and eventually brought them to his hometown, Washington, D.C.

"I was the one that had them in school," he said. "I had them in Boy Scouts. I had them in Girl Scouts. I had them in church. I had them in after-school activities. I had them in soccer.

"I was being the mom and the dad, the aunt and the uncle, the grandpa and the grandma, the niece and nephew all in one," Mr. Walton said.

Mr. Walton said he was arrested for interfering with child custody after taking the children, jailed for several months and barred from seeing them for three years.

10-year-old with sister

The couple's 10-year-old son is now being cared for by one of his three adult sisters. Child Protective Services declined to comment on whether they've investigated the family.

Mr. Walton filed for divorce on Jan. 25, 2001, and two months later, Ms. Walton was granted custody of the children. Mr. Walton was ordered to pay $193.75 a month in child support.

Richard Michael Pruitt / DMN Robert Walton,
the father of a 12-year-old girl accused of shooting
her mother, is prohibited from seeing his children
and lives in a motel. He filed for divorce in 2001.

Last month, the Texas attorney general filed charges against Mr. Walton for failing to make those payments. Mr. Walton said he is unable to pay because he can't get a job because of his disorder. A hearing is scheduled for Oct. 28.

Mr. Walton denied the allegations in the divorce records, saying his wife lied to get the children back.

'She's lying'

"She's lying, she's lying, she's lying," he said.

He also denied his stepdaughter's sexual-assault allegation.

"She's not telling the truth," he said. "In 1989, I was running up and down the highway, cleaning 18-wheeler trucks. I was barely even home."

Could all of that help lead to Sunday morning's shooting? The police investigation will continue, Sgt. Kirkpatrick said, but the cause could be little more than a young girl angry that her mother had grounded her.

"She appeared to be out of control," Sgt. Kirkpatrick said. "Obviously the mother seemed to be having trouble with her."

Staff writer Jason Trahan contributed to this report.

E-mail teiserer@dallasnews.com , mgrabell@dallasnews.com and myoung@dallasnews.com