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Classmates Honor Boy As Scene Of Triple Slaying Is Torn Down

News Channel 8 photo by PAUL LAMISON

Neighbors say they're glad to see the mobile home torn down.

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By CHIP OSOWSKI | News Channel 8
and MIKE WELLS | The Tampa Tribune

Published: May 28, 2008

Updated: 05/28/2008 04:43 pm

LUTZ - As a demolition crew's backhoe ripped down the walls of a mobile home where a young mother and her two children were found slain, her son's classmates honored them this morning by planting a memorial garden.

The bodies of Lisa Freiberg, 26, and her children, Zachary, 7, and Heather Savannah, 2, and the family's white German shepherd were found May 5 inside their home on South Mobile Villa Drive. The property is owned by Freiberg's parents, Barbara and Keith Freiberg.

Her live-in boyfriend, Edward Covington, 35, is charged with three counts of first-degree murder, three counts of abuse of dead human bodies, one count of cruelty to animals and one count of violating probation. He is being held without bail.

Children at the Learning Gate Community School in Lutz greatly miss their first-grade classmate, teacher Lisa Arias said.

"Every day they're still drawing pictures for him and remembering him and talking about him," Arias said. "He's quite the topic of conversation each and every day. This is just another way for them to express themselves."

The 6- and 7-year-olds planted 10 wishbone flowers and a tree at Zachary's grandparents' house in Lutz this morning and then carefully carried in a bench to add to the memorial garden.

A plaque on the bench reads: "You Laughed. You Learned. You Were Loved."

Barbara Freiberg couldn't pass up receiving hugs from her grandson's many friends.

"Of course not," she said. "No way."

The children planted another memorial garden at the Learning Gate Community School later in the afternoon.

"They understand the permanence of this, and it makes them very sad," Arias said.

Meanwhile, the removal of the Lisa Freiberg's mobile home might help alleviate the grief of her neighbors, said a handful of them watching men in hard hats knock down the walls and roof.

A pink shoe, a blue laundry basket and a number of other personal items stood out amongst the piles of boards, insulation and siding. A crewman operating a backhoe for Kimmons Construction scooped the debris into a large metal trash container that would be hauled away later.

A large memorial of flowers, pictures and toys that mourners started weeks ago on a nearby corner is also gone.

Neighbor Tim Kelly said Keith Freiberg recently retrieved some of the items placed in honor of his daughter and grandchildren and left the rest to be discarded.

There were enough teddy bears left to fill three kitchen waste bags, Kelly said. He collected them, air-fluffed them in his clothes drier and donated them to the Shriner's Hospital for Children.

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