RECORDS DESCRIBE SPREE OF SEX, CRIME

A violent crime spree fueled by sex and drugs resulted in the October
2000 death of an off-duty Bexar County sheriff's deputy, according to
court records and other documents.

Joshua Maxwell and his stripper girlfriend are portrayed as a pair of
ruthless lovers in the documents, which are part of the file lawyers
use as they sift through 150 jurors to hear the capital murder case
against Maxwell.

Most of the details of how Deputy Rudy Lopes was killed came from
Maxwell himself. Authorities said the Indiana ex-convict with the
shaven head and goatee sat at a table, drawing on cigarettes and
sipping coffee, as he calmly explained to police how he killed the
deputy and lured other victims with ads seeking sex with gay or
bisexual men in order to rob them.

Maxwell, 23, spilled every detail to police, taking up 12 hours of
tapes recounting the alleged crime spree that he and his girlfriend,
Tessie McFarland, 22, embarked on in the fall of 2000. The binge,
which included a two-week stop in San Antonio, left two people dead,
authorities allege.

For the young pair, it was a quick trip from obscurity in the Midwest
to national notoriety, triggering comparisons in the media with other
fugitive couples such as Bonnie and Clyde and the love-struck,
homicidal duo in the movie "Natural Born Killers.

"The criminal careers of this self-proclaimed modern-day Bonnie and
Clyde ended with their arrests following a long, wild, rolling
gunfight with police in San Francisco. Authorities are calling for the
death penalty for the couple, especially Maxwell.

"Regardless of whether he pleads guilty and we avoid a trial, our
office still intends to seek the death penalty against him," said
Assistant District Attorney Jim Kopp, who will prosecute the case,
along with Mary Nelda Valadez.

On Friday, lawyers began questioning potential jurors, a task that
could take up to three weeks, officials said. A trial date for
McFarland, the mother of a 3-year-old son, has not been set.

Meantime, producers with the cable network Court TV have expressed an
interest in covering the trial.

Attorneys for both sides said the national publicity could make the
trial more difficult. They declined to discuss the details of the
case, citing the ongoing jury selection process.

"There are people who will say they are strongly against the death
penalty and people who are strongly for it. You will also get people
who simply want to be in the trial because it is certainly very
interesting," said Maxwell's attorney, Bill Berchelmann. "We have to
go through each and every one of them and find someone in the middle.

" According to court documents and police records, the pair used sex
to prey on men.

The crime spree began Sept. 11, 2000, when the couple reportedly
hooked up with Robby Bott, a 45-year-old Federal Express mechanic they
met through a telephone-sex dating line in Speedway, Ind., according
to court records.

After a night of drinking, smoking marijuana and sexual activities,
the couple turned on Bott and forced him to pay for purchases at area
stores and malls, court documents state.

Later, the couple ransacked Bott's home, pilfering a long and bizarre
list of household items, including a soldering iron, two vacuum
cleaners, a train set, pillowcases, towels, motor oil and a toaster,
according to court records.

Bott's body later was found in the trunk of his burning
car.

Using a stolen car, the couple drove to Florida and then to San
Antonio. As she had done in Indiana and Florida, McFarland got a job
as a topless dancer. Videotapes obtained by police depicted McFarland
and Maxwell having sex and smoking marijuana in Florida, according to
court records.

On Oct. 4, 2000, Maxwell placed a personal ad in a telephone dating
service he found through the San Antonio Current. In the message,
Maxwell said he wanted to meet gay or bisexual men for a sex romp
while his wife watched. At least four area men responded to the ad,
documents show.

According to court records, the couple met and robbed at least one of
them.

Sometime during their two-week stay in San Antonio, Maxwell and
McFarland met up with Lopes, a veteran jailer at Bexar County Jail.
Authorities have remained mum on the details of how the three met.

Lopes disappeared Oct. 11, 2000. A girl walking in a wooded area
behind a Northeast Side shopping center found his body the next day.

According to court records, the couple was with Lopes buying lingerie
at a Windsor Park Mall store. That's where authorities later found the
Chevy Corsica that Maxwell is accused of stealing in Indiana. A
videotape taken from an automated teller machine showed McFarland
using Lopes' ATM card to make a withdrawal, according to records.

Shortly after the deputy's slaying, local police went public in hopes
of catching the couple.

Their break came when a San Francisco police officer spotted Maxwell
running a stop sign while driving Lopes' stolen truck. That prompted a
long police chase in which McFarland reportedly fired at the pursuing
officers. McFarland was shot in the neck.

When police arrested Maxwell, they said he was wearing Lopes'
jewelry.

During police questioning, Maxwell reportedly discussed the crime
spree in detail, downplaying his girlfriend's role. The statements
have not been released.

In a jailhouse interview with a San Francisco television station, he
said: "I took what (Lopes) had and was planning to drive him off
somewhere and leave him. That way, I could get away. But it didn't
happen like that. He tried to head-butt me."

The couple was later brought to Texas for trial.

According to jail officials, Maxwell on one occasion re-enacted Lopes'
slaying in front of a jail guard.