Bond denied for University student charged in death of girl, 13

A worker directs traffic in the parking lot of a Blacksburg funeral home on Wednesday. McCoy Funeral Home hosted visitation for 13-year-old Nicole Lovell, who authorities say was stabbed to death after… This January 2016 photo provided by Blacksburg Police Department shows Virginia Tech student Natalie Keepers, who was arrested in connection with the death of Nicole Madison Lovell.

In this image made from video and provided by WMAR-TV, in Baltimore, David Eisenhauer runs in the Baltimore area.

A judge ordered Keepers held without bail.

Pettitt did not suggest a possible motive in court, or describe the killing itself.

Tammy Weeks, Lovell’s mother, said she discovered a nightstand pushed up against the door to Lovell’s room and a window ajar on the day she disappeared.

Defense lawyers argued that Keepers’ mental health could unravel behind bars.

When Mr. Keepers said that his daughter wanted to be an aerospace engineer, just like him, the two started crying.

Keepers spoke in court as well, telling the judge that she began cutting her own body after being bullied in school, and has been on Prozac and in therapy since then.

A presentation of facts, including information on Keepers’ involvement in Lovell’s murder, was also given during the hearing.

Eisenhauer is charged with kidnapping and first degree murder.

Virginia Tech sophomore Natalie M. Keepers, 19, was initially charged with being an accessory after the fact of Nicole’s murder and with improper disposal of a dead body.

Eisenhauer told police he had given Nicole a “side hug” but then left and went to the dorm room of a close friend, Pettitt said. Pettitt said Eisenhaur and Keepers planned the murder, went to the Walmart in Christiansburg and bought a shovel, reports WDBJ.

Keepers helped Eisenhaur move Nicole’s remains into the trunk of his Lexus, Pettitt said.

A neighbor whose daughters played with Lovell hours before her disappearance last week has told reporters Lovell had shared texts she exchanged through the smartphone messaging app Kik with an 18-year-old male she planned to meet. Authorities have not confirmed that this was Eisenhauer’s photo. So was the girl’s “Minions” character blanket. Keepers is charged with being an accessory before and after the crime, and she’s accused of helping to hide Nicole’s body.

Her former math teacher told the Associated Press he didn’t recognize her by the mug shot because she always seemed “bubbly and happy and excited about her future” while attending Hammond High School. She wore a burnt orange jumpsuit with “WVRJ Inmate” written on the back, and had her hands shackled to her waist.

“I’ve learned how to love myself and to take care of myself and deal with any stress that I have”, Keepers said, describing how she had promised a friend that if she stopped cutting herself, she would get a tattoo of a semi-colon, representing that her life was not ending, but taking a new path.

She said she is on antidepressants and medication for anxiety.

Fellow student 18-year-old David Eisenhauer also is charged in the death; he’s accused of kidnapping and fatally stabbing Nicole.

Eisenhauer and Keepers were both arrested over the weekend; both are engineering students.