The wife of murder suspect Arron Lewis appeared before a Little Rock district judge Friday -- a day after she was arrested and charged in the September kidnapping and murder of North Little Rock real-estate agent Beverly Carter.
Pulaski County sheriff's deputies arrested Crystal Hope Lowery, 41, of 165 Randall Drive in Jacksonville on Thursday on charges of capital murder and kidnapping. Deputies filed those same charges on her husband, Arron Lewis, in late September.
Lowery, who is being held without bail in the Pulaski County jail, appeared before Judge Wayne Gruber via closed circuit television Friday morning. The judge entered a preliminary plea of innocent on her behalf.
Pulaski County Chief Deputy Prosecutor John Johnson requested that Lowery be held without bail. Rick Holiman, who said he has been working with Lowery for several weeks, agreed but reserved the right to request bail at a later date.
Gruber did not address Lowery during the brief hearing.
Affidavits for the arrests of both Lewis and Lowery have been sealed. Both Johnson and Prosecuting Attorney Larry Jegley have said their office requested that court records be sealed in an effort to keep from prejudicing potential jurors.
"It's important that jurors be informed by what happens in the courtroom," Johnson said Friday after Lowery's hearing.
Carter, 50, disappeared the evening of Sept. 25 after leaving her home to meet a potential client in Scott, a rural community east of North Little Rock. Her husband discovered her car, with her purse locked inside, several hours later.
A three-day search of the area, involving members of multiple law enforcement agencies and hundreds of volunteers, did not yield any immediate clues to Carter's whereabouts.
Little Rock police arrested Lewis on Sept. 29. After about 12 hours of interrogation sessions, deputies charged Lewis in Carter's kidnapping and murder. A short time later, in the early hours of Sept. 30, Carter's body was discovered in a shallow grave near Argos Southern Star Concrete in Cabot.
Deputies arrested Lowery on Sept. 29 on charges of theft by receiving, although the sheriff's office has refused to specify what property Lowery had received or from whom she had received it. Lowery was fingerprinted, then released with a citation to appear in court, and had been free until her arrest Thursday.
Metro on 11/01/2014