STEPHANIE KLEIN-DAVIS The Roanoke Times

A wreath stands on the lawn at the corner of U.S. 220 and Indian Grave Road in the Clearbrook community where two people were found shot to death on Monday morning.

UPDATED June 9: Clearbrook murder-suicide victim identified as mother of four

George "Kenny" Whitt was 12 when his mother was sentenced to 40 years in prison for murdering her lover to collect $100,000 in insurance money.

Whitt found himself in prison five years later for a robbery in Roanoke.

His trouble ended early Monday morning. Whitt, 30, killed a 33-year-old acquaintance and then turned the handgun on himself, Roanoke County police said. Their bodies were discovered on the lawn of a medical center in Southwest Roanoke County, near Franklin Road and Indian Grave Road, about a half-mile from Whitt's home.

Police have not publicly identified the woman, but one of her two ex-husbands said she is Diamond Underwood, Whitt's girlfriend and a mother of four children ages 3 to 14.

"I always tried to warn her that she'd get with the wrong guy and something like this was going to happen," said Timothy Mullins, Underwood's ex-husband and the father of her two sons, ages 14 and 12.

Whitt grew up in New Castle in the shadow of his mother's crime.

In 1991, Nellie Sue Whitt ran over her boyfriend, Roy Thompson, with a pickup truck in Bedford County. She told authorities that Thompson, depressed over money since leaving his wife, committed suicide by throwing himself in front of the pickup.

But investigators were suspicious of an insurance policy that had been changed days before the death to make Whitt the beneficiary. Two days after the killing, Whitt put the title of Thompson's truck and motorcyle in her name and ordered a personalized license plate that read "For Sue."

Her mother, Verna Horn, took the witness stand for the prosecution, saying Whitt plotted the murder for insurance money and threatened to kill her and jurors after the verdict.

Nellie Sue Whitt remains jailed at the Virginia Correction Center for Women in Goochland County.

At her sentencing, she blamed her estranged parents for her problems.

"If I'd had a mama to put her arms around me and love me up and say, 'Sue, I love you, and I'm proud of you,' I wouldn't have made some of the decisions I've made," she said.

Whitt family members, reached by phone at Verna Horn's apartment in Roanoke, declined to speak with a reporter Tuesday.

Kenny Whitt and his estranged wife filed for divorce in Franklin County Circuit Court in September, according to court records. He had been married once before and divorced in 2001.

Underwood had been divorced twice, according to Mullins and court records.

Her first marriage, with Mullins, fell apart when she began seeing another man, Mullins said. The two remained friends because of their boys.

She lived with her two sons until about March, when she broke up with a boyfriend and didn't have a place to stay, Mullins said. The children had been staying with him since then, he said.

Underwood hasn't lived with her other two children, girls ages 9 and 3, since she separated from her second husband a year ago, Mullins said.

That divorce was finalized in February, according to court records.

On Thursday, Underwood and Whitt stopped by Mullins' Rocky Mount home to pick up the boys and take them swimming at Smith Mountain Lake.

Whitt "seemed like a real nice guy," Mullins said. His sons told him they liked Whitt.

On Friday, Mullins said, he received a text message from Underwood saying, "No matter what, I'll always love you."

"Maybe she knew something," he said. "That was odd of her to send that."

Staff writer Duncan Adams and news researcher Belinda Harris contributed to this report.