Report: Wife Made Children Move Husband's Dead Body

OCALA, Fla. -- Gruesome new details were released on Friday in the case of Delores Laster.

Orange County detectives said Laster shot her husband in the back of the head and then recruited his children to drag his body out to the garage.

The public school teacher is charged with first-degree murder in the death of her husband in 1988.

The document released on Friday is more than 900 pages, but right off the top there are chilling statements from Laster's two children about what happened in the house 21 years ago.

The children, now adults, told detectives what they said their mother asked them to do.

Delores Laster, 61, has always maintained that she did not kill her husband, Clarence. But a newly released report not only suggested that she shot her husband in the back of the head, but it also showed she asked her children -- ages 10 and 12 at the time -- to help her move his body.

"I always felt in my heart that she done it, but now we know," said the victim's son, Juan Laster. "It's going to be a closure to the family. We're very upset about it."

Juan Laster is the victim's oldest son. He said, at one point, though they didn't live together, all the children were close.

"For some reason, when this did happen, she just the took kids away from us," he said.

On the morning of March 19, 1988, Laster's daughter told investigators that her mother woke her up to ask for help moving her dad into the garage.

Kristy Dandridge stated that her father was too heavy, so she was told to wake her brother, Clyde, to help.

Clyde Laster, who is now 32, told detectives that his sister woke him and told him his dad was hurt and they needed his help. He said that when he walked into his parents' bedroom, he saw his father lying on the floor with blood on the back of his head.

The document said Clyde Laster's mother told him that his father had been drinking, fell down and struck his head on the night stand.

Clyde Laster said that his father was semi-coherent and was left in the garage covered in plastic when they left for a trip to visit his grandparents in Gainesville, the report said.

The victim's eldest son said he just wants to know why this happened.

"She was still a teacher and being in front of those kids, acting like it was nothing," Juan Laster said.

The newly released documents also said that the children were told to take off their clothes and put them in a plastic bag. They then left for their grandparents' home.

The report said that they stopped at a shopping plaza just off Interstate 75 in Ocala, where Laster's daughter said she saw her mother pull behind the stores and throw the bag containing their bloody clothes into the Dumpster.

The state said Delores Laster applied for retirement earlier this month -- a week before the school board was scheduled to vote on firing her.

Starting May 1, she is eligible for a state teacher's pension of $2,983 a month for her 40 years of service in the Orange County School System. But the state said there's a chance that pension could be forfeited if she is convicted of murder.

Delores Laster's trial is set for July.