| Murders of Thomas and Jackie Hawks | |
|---|---|
| Location | Newport Beach, California, U.S. |
| Date | November 15, 2004 |
Attack type | Double-murder by drowning |
| Victims | Thomas and Jackie Hawks |
| Perpetrators |
|
| Motive | Financial gain |
| Verdict | Deleon, Henderson, Kennedy: Guilty on all counts Machain, Gardner: Pleaded guilty |
| Convictions | Deleon, Kennedy First-degree murder with special circumstances (2 counts) Henderson: First-degree murder (2 counts) Machain:
Accessory after-the-fact |
| Sentence | Deleon, Kennedy: Death ( de jure ) [a] Henderson: Two consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole Machain: 20+1⁄3 years in prison Gardner: 1 year in jail [b] |
Thomas and Jackie Hawks were a couple from Prescott, Arizona, United States, who were murdered in 2004.
Skylar Preciosa Deleon, Jennifer Henderson, and John Fitzgerald Kennedy were convicted by juries for these murders. Deleon and Kennedy were sentenced to death while Henderson was sentenced to two terms of life in prison without parole. Two other people, Alonso Machain and Myron Sandora Gardner Sr., accepted plea bargains after testifying for the prosecution in the trials of Deleon, Henderson, and Kennedy. [2] [3]
Thomas Hawks was a retired probation officer and bodybuilder. He and his second wife Jackie owned a 55-foot yacht, the Well Deserved, which they treated as their permanent home and on which they sailed for two years around the Pacific Ocean and the Gulf of California. In 2004, they decided to sell their yacht and set up a home in Newport Harbor to be closer to their grandchild. [2] Jackie (née O'Neill) Hawks had helped raise Tom's sons from his first marriage since adolescence. When the wife of Hawks' older son was expecting their first child, Jackie treated the news as if it would be her natural grandchild. [15]
Their advertisement for the yacht sale was answered in November by Deleon. The couple was initially skeptical of Deleon, but they became more receptive when Deleon's pregnant wife, Henderson, as well as the couple's child, were also at the meeting. [16] The Hawks were last seen alive on the morning of November 15, 2004, heading out of the harbor. The yacht returned, but they did not. [2] Neither body has ever been recovered. [17]
Police inquired into the couple's disappearance. On November 26, 2004, it was discovered that an attempt was made to access the Hawks's bank account from Mexico. The family was notified, and filed a missing-persons report with the Carlsbad, California police department. [2]
On November 29, the police interviewed Deleon. Deleon claimed to have bought the boat from the Hawks couple, and provided proof-of-purchase documents. Deleon told police that the sellers left in their car with the purchase money, and named Alonso Machain as a witness to the purchase. Deleon claimed to have purchased the boat with the intent of laundering money related to an armed burglary in 2002. [18] [17]
In March 2005, after initially fleeing to Mexico and returning, Machain confessed to the crime. He was arrested in connection with the couple's disappearance along with Deleon and Henderson. Deleon initially maintained innocence, claiming they were not present at the time and speculated that the Hawkses were killed over a bad drug deal. [17] [19]
Authorities alleged that during a sea trial of the boat in Newport Harbor a few days after meeting the Hawkses, Deleon and accomplices Machain and Kennedy bound and gagged the couple and threw them overboard, tied to the yacht's anchor. [16] [20] Deleon allegedly masterminded the plan to kill the couple for financial gain. [17] [21] [22]
Henderson was found guilty on two counts of first-degree murder on November 17, 2006, after four hours of jury deliberation. In October 2007, Henderson was sentenced to two life terms without parole. [23] She is currently housed at Central California Women's Facility in Chowchilla, California. [24]
While awaiting trial in jail, Deleon was charged with soliciting another inmate to murder his cousin and father. Deleon was also accused of killing John Jarvi, a resident of Anaheim, California, who was found dead in Mexico in 2003. Deleon's father and cousin (who was charged as an accessory to the Jarvi murder) were considered "important witnesses" in both murder cases. [22] Defense lawyers claimed that Deleon's need for money to finance sex reassignment surgery was the motivation for the Hawks' murders. [25] [26] [27]
On September 22, 2008, jury selection began in the case against Deleon. [28] In a consolidated case, Deleon was jointly tried for the murders of Thomas and Jackie Hawks and John Jarvi. Despite Deleon's earlier protestations of innocence, Deleon's attorney conceded at trial that Deleon had indeed committed all three murders. The attorney said that he had taken the case to trial only to argue to a jury that Deleon should not be sentenced to death. [29] On October 20, Deleon was convicted of three counts of first-degree murder with special circumstances for financial gain and multiple victims and on November 6, 2008, the jury rendered a death verdict. [30] On April 10, 2009, Deleon was sentenced to death by Orange County Superior Court Judge Frank Fasel. [31]
On February 19, 2009, John Fitzgerald Kennedy was found guilty on two counts of first degree murder after less than three hours of jury deliberation. [32] He was sentenced to death on May 1, 2009. [33]
Machain, after testifying against Deleon, Henderson, and Kennedy, pleaded guilty to two counts each of voluntary manslaughter, kidnapping, and robbery. On June 15, 2009, he was sentenced to 20 years and 4 months. He served his sentence at Valley State Prison in Chowchilla, California, and was paroled in 2021. [24]
In March 2009, after spending four years incarcerated, Myron Gardner pleaded guilty to "accessory after the fact" and the murder charges against him were dropped. [34] [1] [35]
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