A series of recorded conversations in which Aarone Thompson's stepmother, Shely Lowe, refers to the girl as dead and buried is among the key evidence in the Aurora police homicide investigation, 9News is reporting.

Aurora police detectives have reportedly played the recorded conversations to family members as part of their investigation.

According to family members who have heard the tapes, Lowe talks about Aarone in the past tense and says the 6-year- old girl is dead, rather than missing, 9News reported.

Aaron Thompson called Aurora police Nov. 14, 2005, and said his daughter had run away.

But after three days, police called off the search and said Aarone had most likely been killed up to 18 months earlier. Police said no "credible person" had seen her alive in that time.

Police named Aaron Thompson and Lowe, his common-law wife, "persons of interest" in the homicide investigation.

Lowe died of heart problems in May 2006, shortly after an Arapahoe County grand jury began hearing testimony in the case against her and Thompson. The grand jury's investigation is ongoing.

Kenyetta Fields, Aarone's 20- year-old half-brother, told 9News that on the recordings, a woman identified only as a close friend of Lowe's asks her if she plans to place flowers on Aarone's grave.

Fields says that Lowe can be heard saying, "No, he (Aaron Thompson) going to do that, he going to do that," 9News reported.

Fields also had a message for his father, Aaron Thompson. "You can never come back to Michigan ever, never. If I come across you one time, you will die. Point blank. That's just how I feel about you."

Lowe's cousin Ebony Williams told the station that Lowe tells her friend on the recordings, "I'm not going to tell you where she is, but I'll give (Aaron) some flowers, and he can go where his little girl is and he can put flowers where she is."

Sam Riddle, a Thompson family friend, questioned whether the recordings were legitimate or even existed.

Spokespeople for the law enforcement agencies investigating the case said they could not comment on the existence or authenticity of the tapes.