WACO, Texas -- The stepfather of missing Baylor basketball player Patrick Dennehy said Thursday that as authorities search for Dennehy's body that two families suffer.

Dennehy, 21, has been missing since mid-June and is presumed dead. His former teammate and roommate Carlton Dotson has been charged with Dennehy's death, based on statements police said he made to them.

The two were apparently close, and both families say they can't understand why Dotson would have shot Dennehy in the head, as authorities allege.

"You know he's suffering too, and his whole family is also suffering, and nobody needs to be going through this,'' Brian Brabazon, Dennehy's stepfather, said about Dotson. "His family's going through something similar to what we're going through and yeah, I do pray for Carlton.''

Dennehy's mother, Valorie Brabazon, his stepfather, half-sister and girlfriend, Jessica De La Rosa, cleaned out Dennehy's Waco apartment Wednesday.

"It was very hard on me as a mother trying to fold his clothes,'' Valorie Brabazon said. " ... Everything in there was his, and the only thing that was missing is (actually) my son.''

The apartment building -- with well-manicured lawns, swimming pool and sand volleyball court -- is across the street from the gold-domed Ferrell Center, where Dennehy hoped to play this winter. He sat out last season after transferring from New Mexico last year, as mandated by NCAA rules.

Police say they will continue searching for Dennehy's body in three locations provided by Dotson, who is being held in his home state of Maryland without bond. An extradition hearing is set for Aug. 19.

De La Rosa implored Dotson to tell all he knows about Dennehy's disappearance. "We need his help. We need Patrick back so bad.''

She said Waco police received at least one tip from a woman who believes she saw Dennehy at a home improvement store on June 28.

"I think it leaves us hopeful,'' she said.

Brian Brabazon said the family may meet with Baylor Athletic Director Tom Stanton on Thursday. He said he had not heard from basketball Coach Dave Bliss recently.

He and his wife have said that Dennehy was threatened shortly before his disappearance and reported the threats to his coaches. They contend the coaches did nothing, but Bliss has said Dennehy never reported any threats to his coaches.

Valorie Brabazon said after her son disappeared, De La Rosa told her that assistant coach Rodney Belcher was one of at least two Baylor coaches whom Dennehy told that he was being threatened.

"I talked to Coach Rodney,'' the mother said. "He said Patrick had come to him and said that someone was stalking him. ... But the coach said my son never gave him a name.

"The coach said Patrick didn't ask him for help. But I said, 'That's a help-me call.' You shouldn't have to say, 'Could you please call the police?'''

Belcher, who coached at New Mexico when Dennehy played there two years ago, was on a recruiting trip and not available for comment, a team spokesman said.

Brian Brabazon said talk about a NCAA investigation into whether Dennehy received money and special favors from Baylor coaches wasn't "going to help us find Patrick.''

"We have more questions than we have answers. I don't want to be talking about that,'' he said.

The 6-foot-10, 230-pound Dennehy was last seen on campus June 12; his family reported him missing June 19. The next day, Delaware police told Waco authorities that an informant said Dotson told someone he shot Dennehy in the head after the two argued.

Dennehy's Tahoe was found abandoned, without license plates, in a Virginia Beach, Va., mall parking lot June 25.