Unsealed search warrants reveal new details in deaths of Saratoga Springs mother, son

Curtis Booker, Daily Herald
Townhomes in a Saratoga Springs neighborhood where an 8-year-old boy was found dead and his mother in critical condition are pictured Monday, March 31, 2025.Newly unsealed search warrants are shedding light on new details connected to the deaths of a Saratoga Springs mother and her 8-year-old son who were killed in March.
On the morning of March 28, officers responded to Jessica Lyman’s townhome in the area of 1200 Willowbrook Lane, after police said her 17-year-old daughter called and said she’d discovered two people had been shot inside the residence.
Lyman was found lying next to her son Eli Painter on a bed in the master bedroom of the home, police said.
Painter was declared dead at the scene and Lyman was transported to Utah Valley Hospital, where she died three days later.
In the months following the incident, police have remained tight-lipped about the investigation, releasing little to no information publicly.
However, on Monday, search warrants filed in April were unsealed.
The warrants, obtained by the Daily Herald, provide previously undisclosed information about the investigation thus far.
A Saratoga Springs police detective submitted a warrant to Apple Inc. in efforts to gain access to data from Lyman and her 15-year-old son’s email and phone accounts.
Within the unsealed warrants, investigators indicated that during a search of the home, they located two .22-caliber shell casings in the room where the mother and son were found dead.
“Both appeared to have been shot in the head with a small caliber round,” the warrant reads.
Police said two BB guns were also found in the home, but no other guns were discovered.
Search and rescue crews canvassed an area at the nearby Jordan River and throughout the subdivision to look for weapons, but none were found, according to the affidavit.
Investigators said surveillance footage obtained by a nearby home showed a person in a mask around Lyman’s home in the early hours of the morning of the shooting.
Police said a mask resembling the one on the surveillance video was found inside a bedroom at the family’s home.
“The mask was white and brown; it resembles the mask that is seen on the video recordings that neighbors previously provided to law enforcement,” the warrant reads.
A search of Lyman’s phone records showed a text message conversation from July 2024 between the mother and her 15-year-old son.
The messages were hostile in nature, with the teen sending profanity-ridden texts to his mother, calling her disparaging names and telling her to shut up, according to the unsealed warrant.
In one of the messages, he writes: “I wish I died in your stomach. Wouldn’t have to put up with you.”
As of Tuesday, Saratoga Springs police have yet to publicly identify any suspects connected to the killings and said their investigation is ongoing.