Murder, attack victims’ mother talks about healing process

Kristie Reed has never hidden her scars.

For more than 10 years, the now 24-year-old has lived with scars across her neck — visible reminders of the day that Paul Powell slit her throat and left her for dead.

And she has never tried to hide them.

“She says ‘I didn’t do it to myself. I have nothing to be ashamed of,’” said her mother, Lorraine Reed Whoberry, speaking from her Cincinnati home. “And she’s right.”

Reed Whoberry says she has lived with her own emotional scars ever since Powell attacked Kristie, then 14, and killed her 16-year-old sister, Stacie Reed, in their Yorkshire home on Jan. 29, 1999.

But watching Kristie grow up is part of what has helped Reed Whoberry heal over the years.

“Watching Kristie get up and get ready for school in the morning, I always thought, ‘If she can do it, so can I,’” Reed Whoberry said.

And that’s how the Reeds have taken the past 10 and a half years, she said: one morning, one day, one step at a time.

“You just think if we can get through those first few days, we can get through the rest of our lives,” Reed Whoberry said.

The Reeds plan to attend Powell’s execution on Tuesday, but Reed Whoberry said it’s something they’ve tried not to spend a lot of time thinking about.

“It’s really hard to allow my mind to go there,” she said. “But we’ve managed to stay busy and not think about it a lot.”

Reed Whoberry says she expects to get some kind of closure after Powell is executed, but she describes at as just “a chapter closing.”

“I’m looking forward to that being over and done with ... It will be justice served and that’s pretty much it,” she said. “It’s not going to bring Stacie back. It’s not going to change what happened to Kristie.”

Reed Whoberry said she is anxious for the execution to be over, in part because it will allow her more time to focus on other things, such as helping other victims of crime.

She started the S.T.A.C.I.E. Foundation — Striving Towards Achieving Compassion, Intervention and Education — to give “Impact of Victimization” seminars to law enforcement officials.

She tells them what happened on Jan. 29, 1999, when Powell entered her family’s home outside Manassas and confronted Stacie — who was home alone after school — stabbed her and stomped on her throat until she died.

Powell waited in the house until 14-year-old Kristie came home from school, tied her up, raped her and stabbed her, leaving her to die in the basement.

Robert Culver, then Lorraine Reed’s fiance, found the girls and called 911.

Reed Whoberry said she got a call from police, but they did not tell her what had happened; and when she got home, she could not enter the house.

It was hours before Reed Whoberry was taken to the hospital to see Kristie, and then hours more for her to locate and see her daughter there.

Reed Whoberry said her story highlights problems in the victim notification process at that time, and by sharing her story she’s been able to affect change both in Prince William County and across the country.

“I basically tell them from day one, what we went through; the hardships and the setbacks,” Reed Whoberry said. “It’s partially a healing process for me as well as a teaching tool for those on the other side, in law enforcement.”

Through those talks, Reed Whoberry said she’s received support from many people and has been able to give support to others.

“One thing we want people to know is that the community, and not just the community of Manassas but everywhere we go, people have extended their support to us and we’re so grateful,” she said.  “It gives us the strength to be able to give support to others.”

Reed Whoberry said she’s also relied on her faith in God to help her over the years, which has helped her come to forgive Powell.

“I realized if I can forgive him God’s going to use me in ways I could never dream of,” she said. “And He has. We get to share the triumph at the end of the tragedy.”

Staff writer Amanda Stewart can be reached at 703-878-8014.