TWO YEARS IN HELL

The double slaying led city and federal lawmen to a Shalimar neighbor-hood to ask questions about the victim’s friends, and particularly about a roommate named Richard.

Senior Airman Rachel Carlson, 24, of 41 12th St., Shalimar, was stabbed to death in the driver’s seat of her 1995 Nissan, Police Chief Maxie Barrow said. Her daughter, Alexis B. Stuart, was stabbed to death while strapped into an infant carrier in the back seat.

The car was found idling in the northbound lane of South Booker Street. The headlights were on.

Lawmen would not identify the teens who found the victims, saying only that they were “around 15.”

Beyond what they found, police on Thurs- day had many questions and few leads in a world filled with suspects. One of the people they want to question is a man named Richard -- they haven’t learned his last name -- who might have been Carlson’s roommate.

“The detectives were looking for [Richard],” a Honeycomb Townhomes neighbor, who asked not to be identified, said Thursday night. She reported being inter- viewed by agents from the Air Force Office of Special Investigations.

The roommate who neighbors told investi-gators about isn’t the only person the OSI wants to talk to, Said Tsgt. Larry Lincoln, an Eglin spokesman.  Lincoln gave the impression of a more scattered search.

“They’re not just asking about the roommate but about any-body,” Lincoln said. “They’re trying to find anybody who knows anything.”

Crestview Police Lt. Jerome Worley also confirmed that rumors of a roommate were  one of the leads investigators were tracking. As of late Thursday night, however, he   said the investigation wasn’t focused on any suspect.

“We’re still looking at anything . . . we’re not getting tunnel vision,” Worley said.

“We have some leads. I don’t know that we have any real suspects,” Barrow said. “We’re just getting   into the investigation.”

The neighbor said Carlson had lived at Honeycomb since Octo- ber, shortly before Hurricane  Opal struck.

Carlson -- an Aloha, Ore., native -- had been in the Air Force since Oct. 7, 1991 and stationed at Eglin since April 24, 1992, Eglin spokes- woman Lois Walsh said. She worked as an operating room technician for the 96th Medical Operations Squadron, Walsh said.

Walsh declined to coordinate any interviews with military personnel who knew Carlson.

Her neighbor reported that she led a quiet life.

“She seemed pretty nice. I didn’t know her very well,” the neighbor said. “She always seemed to take care of the baby.”

Crestview lawmen were  uncharac- teristically quiet Thursday, with- holding information on some elements of the crime.

“We want all t’s crossed and all i’s dotted because [some] dude killed a 3-month old baby,” Bundrick said.

Lawmen did say that the mother and baby were stabbed. They would not say where, or how often. Police said they believe both were killed in the car on Booker Street. They wouldn’t say if they found a murder weapon.

They know Carlson was single. They don’t know of any involvement with a Crestview resident.

The don’t know what brought her to Crestview. Although the neighborhood is know for drug activity, there was no evidence Thursday link-ing drugs to the deaths.

And they don’t know if the killer -- or killers -- knew her.

“Those are all questions we hope to get answered,” Barrow said.

Investigators were working around the clock to find the answers. Bundrick said he was confident the murders would be solved.

Barrow spoke of “when” an arrest is made and promised diligence.

“We work as hard as we can when we have any murder case,” Barrow said. “When there’s a child involved it touches your heart, especially a child that age, something that senseless.”