Lisa Marie Wallace, 30, was married to Christopher James Wallace, and they lived in Alabama. Her best friend was Libby Caldwell, whom she met when they worked together at a Gulf Shores restaurant. The two instantly hit off and saw each other nearly every day.
As bonded as the women were, Libby knew Lisa better than anyone. One day, she saw that her friend’s husband — the man Lisa had devoted her life to and loved — was hurting her .
Wallace was not a nice person, and the marriage was volatile, to put it mildly. Libby spoke with News 3’s Mikhaela Singleton in 2019.
“This one time, I went to hug her, and she winced, and I said to her, Lisa, what’s going on, why are you flinching? Lifted up her shirt, and there were bruises all down her ribs.”
In another incident, Libby recalled, “She came in one day so beat up that our boss thought she had been in a wreck, and he told her she could not work behind the bar with her face busted up like that.”
Libby said she constantly implored Lisa to report Wallace to the police for domestic violence. But Lisa refused because she loved him. She believed the marriage could work and Wallace could change — the typical things abused women desperately want to believe but rarely happen. It’s fair to say that Lisa probably feared her husband and that fear kept her from leaving.
Then, Lisa was diagnosed with a brain tumor. According to Libby, Wallace convinced Lisa to move to Eufaula to be closer to the University of Alabama Birmingham Medical Center, where she was being treated for cancer. However, Lisa dreaded going because she did not know a single soul in Eufaula.
One day, Lisa left a letter with Libby before she left, informing her that if anything happened to her, the police needed to look at her husband.
In 2011, Lisa gave birth to a girl named Libby, after her darling friend, and was over the moon. She did not think she could become pregnant while having cancer and believed the pregnancy was a miracle. Her daughter became her main focus and lit up her dark world. Libby believes the baby girl was a “huge turning point for Lisa to recognize Chris’s abuse.”
If Lisa planned to escape her vile husband, we will never know. Before she had the opportunity to leave Wallace, Lisa vanished without a trace.
The Disappearance of Lisa Marie Wallace
Lisa worked at the River City BBQ restaurant, now BNB BBQ & Grill, at 1366 N. Eufaula Avenue, 1.5 miles from her home, and was scheduled to work the lunch shift on October 27, 2012. She was last seen at her residence near West Chewalla Creek Drive in Eufaula that day.
Wallace told the police the characteristic scenario in a case like this: he and Lisa argued, and she left. According to Wallace, he took their daughter to his mother’s house at 1 p.m. While they were gone, Lisa packed a bag and fled on foot.
Of course, he could not possibly know that she did the latter because he was not home, according to him.
Lisa never arrived at work that day and has never been heard from again. Her mother, Barbara Covey, spoke to Lisa daily, and when she failed to hear from her daughter, Barbara reported her missing.
Libby knew from the get-go that Wallace had something to do with Lisa’s disappearance.
“There has never ever been a doubt in my head that he had something to do with her being missing. You will never be able to convince me that she willingly walked away from that little girl that she thought she could never have,” Libby said.
2014 Police Investigation
AL.com reported in April 2014 that “multiple law enforcement agencies” were in Eufaula and had set up a command center to attempt to locate Lisa’s body. They had received a tip from a “self-proclaimed psychic” who told them she had a vision of Lisa’s body weighed down “by what appeared to be concrete blocks in Lake Eufaula.”
At the same time, an acquaintance of Wallace, Matthew Scott Moss, told investigators he helped dispose of Lisa’s body. Authorities were preparing to interview Moss, Wallace, and many others at the time of the article’s publication. It is unclear what came from the interviews, but police never charged Wallace with his wife’s murder.
February 2019: Wallace Shoots Police Officer, Female Companion, and Himself
Once a violent a-hole, always a violent a-hole.
On February 15, 2019, Wallace, 38, walked into an Auburn pharmacy looking for drugs, and the staff subsequently called the police. Wallace and his unidentified 36-year-old female companion fled in Wallace’s silver Jeep Liberty.
Auburn police officer Justin Sanders stopped the vehicle near the Dollar General on Opelika Road. During the traffic stop, Wallace exited the vehicle through the passenger side and fired multiple shots at Sanders, the police chief said. Sanders survived the shooting.
During a standoff with police at an apartment complex where a relative of Wallace’s lived, Wallace fatally shot his female companion before turning the gun on himself.
I think he knew authorities would go after him for Lisa’s killing, so he took the easy way out instead of going to prison for her murder and shooting a police officer.
The Lee County SWAT Team entered the apartment, used tear gas as a distraction, and a fire started at some point, setting the entire building ablaze. It is unknown what was used to create the fire.
Police never revealed Wallace’s companion’s name, but newspapers mentioned that she was unrelated to Sanders. So, I’m guessing Sanders was her surname.
Officer Sanders spent months in the hospital, returning to work in November 2019.
Unfortunately, with Wallace’s cowardly suicide, it will be hard for investigators to locate Lisa’s remains and prove that he killed her unless those known to Wallace come forward with information. I believe those closest to him know what happened to Lisa. His parents are raising their granddaughter.
Sources
Edgemon, Erin. “Investigators Descend on Eufaula as Missing-Woman Mystery Deepens.” AL.com. https://www.al.com/news/montgomery/2014/04/investigators_descend_on_eufau.html
Singleton, Mikhaela. “Friend Seeks Answers for Missing Wife of Auburn Officer Shooter.” WRBL.com. https://www.wrbl.com/news/local-news/friend-seeks-answers-for-missing-wife-of-auburn-officer-shooter/
WFSA Staff. “Police: Officer’s shooter killed himself, is suspect in wife’s disappearance.” WFSA.com. https://www.wsfa.com/2019/02/18/police-officer-shooting-suspect-killed-himself-is-suspect-wifes-disappearance/
