Editor’s note: Here are the excerpts from a letter written to Damien C. Lewis, jailed on murder charges, by his ex-girlfriend Stacie McClelland of Lawrence. The letter is in response to a three-page handwritten letter that Lewis wrote to her from the Douglas County Jail apologizing for complicating McClelland’s life.

“You lead a double life and I didn’t have a clue. How could you look me in the eye and lie to me like you did?”

“I lost my house, my day-care license, my day-care kids, and most of all, I lost the man I thought I would spend the rest of my life with. I have no where to go, no job, no money to move with. I can’t sleep!! I keep asking myself … why would someone do this when they had a good thing going for them? Everything was handed to you and you threw it all away. All I asked of you was for you to get a job.”

“I’m so angry!!! I’m sad!!! I’m so hurt!!! My head is about to explode with so many emotions!! All you know to say to me is that you are sorry and that you love me!! If you loved me and cared about me, you wouldn’t have brought me and my family into your mess of a life! I was willing to stand by you. I can’t even look at you on television. I’m scared!! Scared that someone you hang with (will) find me or my kids and do something to us because I did the right thing and called the cops to come and pick up what I found in my closet. I’m sure that you don’t even know how I’m feeling right now. No one with a conscience could have done what you’ve done. They treated my house like a crime scene. There were people in and out of my house for three days. They tore my house apart, inside and out. They treated me like I did everything. I told them what I knew, which wasn’t much. I had to tell them what you were wearing on the 10th and the 11th, who you were with, where you told me you were going, when you left, when you came back, what you did when you got back. I didn’t think they were going to let me go until I told them what you were wearing that day.”

“Now my neighbors look at me in a whole different way, thinking to themselves … how dare her bring someone like that into the neighborhood!!! So many people’s lives were in danger and I didn’t even realize it. My sister was scared for her life and I told her she didn’t have a thing to worry about. I keep thinking to myself how this could have been me and my family. The cops kept telling me how lucky I am. That I should go and hug my kids and thank God we are all alive.”