With Discipline Honed by Training, Police Say, Astronaut Set Out to Kill

Neither Nowak nor her attorney, Donald Lykkebak of Orlando, offered any alternate version of events.

But in hearings Tuesday, Lykkebak took issue with police conclusions that Nowak intended to kill or kidnap Shipman. He said she was simply trying to talk to Shipman.

"What we have here is a desperate woman who wants to have a conversation with another woman," he said in the afternoon hearing. "She doesn't shoot her. She doesn't stab her. . . . I would submit to you that she wanted to talk."

Nowak's boss, Chief Astronaut Steven W. Lindsey from Johnson Space Center, came to Orlando and appeared at both court hearings.

"We're here representing NASA, and our main concern is Lisa's health and well-being and to make sure she's safe and we get her through this and we get her back to a safe place with her family," he said at the morning hearing.

But by the end of the afternoon hearing, the judge had raised Nowak's bond to $25,500, in addition to the condition that she be monitored via a Global Positioning System anklet, for which she will pay $15 a day. By evening, she had posted bond and was preparing to be fitted with the anklet. She was expected to return to Houston.

Lisa Marie Caputo Nowak grew up in the Luxmanor neighborhood of Rockville, in a two-story red brick house on Tilden Lane.

Her family in Rockville released a statement late Tuesday. It noted that Nowak and her husband separated a few weeks ago. "We love her very much, and right now, our primary focus is on her health and well-being," the statement said. "Considering both her personal and professional life, these alleged events are completely out of character."

Nowak was co-valedictorian of Charles W. Woodward High School in Rockville and received a master's degree in aeronautical engineering before becoming a full-fledged astronaut in 1998. She attended U.S. Naval Test Pilot School at the Patuxent River Naval Air Station in St. Mary's County and flew as a test pilot in the mid-1990s. Oefelein attended the U.S. Navy Fighter Weapons School and was also at the test pilot school at Patuxent.

In the fall, Nowak captivated audiences at Luxmanor Elementary School and Tilden Middle in Rockville and at the U.S. Naval Academy, all schools she once attended, and her sisters' alma mater, Stone Ridge School of the Sacred Heart in Bethesda, with tales of space. It was a living lesson that hard work pays off.

"All these little girls were lining up to sign autographs," said Matthew Schatzle, a 1985 class officer, recounting the Naval Academy visit. "She represents us. She represents the Navy. She represents NASA. She represents her family. I'm sure she's devastated."

De Vise reported from Washington. Staff writers Chris Jenkins, Marc Kaufman, Moira E. McLaughlin, Katherine Shaver and Steve Vogel and staff researcher Eddy Palanzo contributed to this report from Washington.