Service For Woman Slain For Her Baby -- As Family Mourns, Rep. Newt Gingrich Cites Chicago Case As A Sign Of `Decay'

CHICAGO - Friends and family yesterday prepared to bury Debra Evans, 28, and two of her children slain by attackers who came to the family's apartment to steal a full-term baby from her womb.

James Edwards, Evans' boyfriend and the man who discovered the bodies early Friday, sat silently hunched over in the front row of Keeneyville Bible Church.

Katie Evans, Debra's 17-year-old sister, collapsed, sobbing.

Though the three victims had all been stabbed to death, the Evans family chose to keep open the three white caskets of Debra and her children Samantha, 10, and Joshua, 8.

Despite cosmetics and a Bible placed serenely in her folded arms, the scratches and bruises on Samantha's hands showed how she had struggled with the attackers.

The baby, sliced from his mother's womb by her attackers, was discharged yesterday afternoon from a hospital where he has been treated since police recovered him late Friday.

Jacqueline Annette Williams, the woman accused of wanting Debra Evans' child so badly that she was willing to kill, and two men, Levern Ward and Fedell Caffey, have been charged with kidnapping and first-degree murder in the crime.

The brutal nature of the slayings has shocked the nation.

At a Republican meeting in Nashua, N.H., U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich pointed to the crimes as an example of a nationwide culture of irresponsibility and lawlessness and the failure of the welfare state.

"We turn around one day and find out we have tolerated the decay of our civilization," Gingrich said. "This happened in America."

To Carolyn Milani, it happened within her own family. Debra Evans was the cousin Milani had lived with as a teenager, the friend who loved to go dancing, who loved children and was open and forgiving.

"Debra was a beautiful person and an excellent mother and that's what should be talked about," said cousin Fred Moody.

Evans was an honor student from a religious family. Some say a teenage pregnancy started her slide into a world of dim dance clubs, run-down apartments, welfare and babies with a succession of fathers.

Evans' horrifying end was in sharp contrast to the comfortable world she knew as a teenager in the nearby suburb of Roselle. Her friend Dave Schrader, 28, said Evans and her parents drifted apart when she first got pregnant, and again when she had a baby by a different father.

Schrader said he last saw her about three years ago, when she was living in a dismal apartment in suburban Hanover Park.

At the funeral, a display of photographs and toys in the church depicted a mother working hard to create a cohesive family, despite the challenges of poverty and single parenthood.

"Would you look at these beautiful creatures? How could anyone take such precious life?" Debra's brother Jeremiah wrote under one of the photos.

Information from Associated Press is included in this report.