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A Texas woman who was a witness in a murder case has been missing for nearly two weeks, People reports.
According to the Houston Police Department, Deundrea L. Ford, a 21-year-old mother to a 4-year-old son, went missing on September 21.
Family members said Ford was last seen getting into an unknown man's vehicle outside of the Diva's Bikini Sports Bar & Grill in Houston, where she had been working as a dancer for the past few weeks. Police said she was last seen wearing a black tank top and tan pants.
"I'm confident that something's not right,” Ford’s uncle, Kevin Carriere, told KHOU 11. “This is not her normal behavior.”
Court documents obtained by Fox26 show Ford was a witness to a fatal shooting in May. Ford was sleeping in the front seat of a car when driver Otis Parker was killed outside a Houston apartment complex, according to a probable cause affidavit. The 21-year-old escaped the scene without injury.
Suspected gunman Jamal Brown and accomplices Mariah Green, Quitiana Taylor, and Jarrell Wheeler were charged in June in connection to Parker's death. According to authorities, the killing was a planned robbery over $1,500 that Ford and Taylor made during a work trip to Louisiana.
During the investigation into Parker's killing, investigators found one of the suspects sent a text message about Ford, saying “She ain't safe in Houston...at all.”
Brown was killed by police in July while officers were serving an arrest warrant on a capital murder charge.
“Brown produced a pistol and refused all verbal commands to surrender the pistol,” police said. “Two task force members (assigned to the HCSO) discharged weapons and fatally struck him. It is unknown at this time if Brown discharged his weapon.”
The other three suspects are in custody without bond. It's unclear if the murder case has any connection with Ford's disappearance.
Anyone with information on Ford’s whereabouts is asked to contact the Houston Police Department’s missing persons desk at 832-394-1840.
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