Husband chases his tail about bloody tarp
PLAINFIELD -- Glaring inconsistencies emerged Monday as Craig Stebic tried to fend off reports that blood found in his truck was that of his wife's.
The Naperville Sun on Sunday exclusively reported that blood found on a tarp in Stebic's truck match the DNA of his wife, Lisa, who was reported missing May 1. Lisa reportedly was last seen by Stebic around 6 p.m. April 30 in the home they share at 13244 Red Star Drive. Neither her cell phone nor credit cards have been used since. Her 38th birthday was Saturday.
The discovery of the tarp granted police a warrant to search the Stebic home late May 14.
Since The Sun's report, Stebic has responded to the media with a variety of explanations as to what kind of blood it was and how it got there.
Stebic on Sunday said the blood might be from a deer, adding that he had been deer hunting in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan recently, according to one broadcast report.
When Sun news partner CBS 2 asked Stebic about the report that Lisa's blood was found in his truck he said, "There's nothing there."
But yet he told Sun news partner The Herald News, "I know there's blood all over the back of the truck. For them to find blood in the back of the truck doesn't surprise me a bit."
Stebic also told CBS 2 he hunts all the time and had last used his truck to haul deer in November. But when CBS 2 asked him about using the truck for recent hunting trips - since deer season ended in January - he referred to the last weekend before Lisa disappeared saying, "We used it to hunt rabbits that weekend."
Furthermore, Stebic told CBS 2 he does not have a tarp.
But Fox News reported Monday night that police did in fact recover a small amount of blood that was swabbed off a tarp in Craig Stebic's 2002 Chevrolet S-10 pickup truck during a search he voluntarily allowed them to conduct.
The tarp was not taken during the search, knocking down Stebic and his lawyer's contention that no such tarp existed or that they were never notified of a tarp being taken during a search.
"How accurate is this information?" Stebic's attorney Dion Davi said in response to The Sun's report. "On the other hand, if it is accurate, why was this information not provided in (the police's) list of items?"
Davi says the reports about the discovery of Lisa's blood in Craig's truck have upset his client.
Police would not comment Monday on The Sun's report.
Coping with disappearance
Stebic also said he didn't know about a petition to evict him from the house that Lisa mailed to her attorney the day she disappeared.
The petition, in which Lisa accused Craig of verbal abuse, was introduced by Lisa's attorney Glenn Kahn as part of his response to Craig's motion for temporary custody of the couple's son, Zach, 10, and 12-year-old daughter, Alexis.
The motion will be heard this morning in Will County Circuit Court.
Monday, three of Lisa's co-workers from Lincoln Elementary School stopped by her house and left a bouquet of purple flowers on the front step.
One nearby resident said it's been hard to deal with Lisa's disappearance.
"We miss her," she said. "You know you think she's gone ... but you still hope she's coming back."
CBS 2 and The Herald News contributed to this report.
