SANTA ANA – Convicted murderer Skylar Deleon was sentenced today to die by lethal injection for three slayings, including the murders at sea of a couple forced to sign over ownership of their yacht, then tied to an anchor and thrown overboard.

Deleon, 29, of Long Beach, did not show any emotion or speak at the hearing. He knew the sentence was coming. A jury in November recommended that he should die rather than spend life in prison. No Orange County judge has ever reversed a jury’s death verdict.

Thomas and Jackie Hawks, who were living aboard their 55-foot yacht, called the Well Deserved, were murdered on Nov. 15, 2004, after showing the boat to Deleon. The couple had hoped to sell the boat and move to Arizona to help raise their newborn grandson.

To read a timeline of events in the case, click here.

Ryan Hawks, one of the couple’s sons, told the judge he hoped Deleon’s two children wouldn’t be able to visit him while he waited on death row.

“I know the best possible environment for his kids, (would be) not knowing who their father is and what he did,” Hawks said.

Deleon’s five-week trial ended in November, when he was convicted of three counts of first-degree murder. During closing arguments, prosecutor Matt Murphy called the murders “diabolical and heartless,” saying Deleon showed no remorse and was after money.

He was behind bars in the Seal Beach jail when he plotted the first killing in December 2003. He persuaded fellow inmate Jon Peter Jarvi, 45, of Anaheim, to give him more than $50,000, purportedly to take part in an investment opportunity in Mexico. Instead, Deleon later killed Jarvi in Mexico by slashing his throat and leaving him to die at the side of a road.

Jeff Jarvi, the brother of Jon Peter Jarvi, asked Judge Frank Fasel to impose the death penalty at today’s sentencing. He said he had nightmares about the killings, dreaming he was tied to an anchor or crawling on a desert floor like his brother.

“The Hawks, my brother, were murdered all for a boat,” Jeff Jarvi said after the sentencing. “He put more value on a boat than three people’s lives.”

In November 2004, Deleon then moved on to the Hawks.

Deleon convinced the couple he wanted to buy their boat. He introduced the Hawks to his then-pregnant wife, Jennifer Henderson, and one-year-old daughter, to put them at ease, prosecutors said.

During a test cruise aboard the Well Deserved near Santa Catalina Island on Nov. 15, 2004, Deleon and two co-conspirators subdued the Hawkses and forced them to sign sales documents.

The couple begged for their lives, according to one witness, but they were tied to a 65-pound anchor. Still alive, they were thrown into the water. Their bodies were never recovered.

The prosecutor, in interviews after the sentencing, said Deleon deserved his death penalty.

“It’s difficult to imagine a case more cold-blooded and calculated than these series of murders,” Murphy said.

During a jailhouse interview in January, Deleon said he was remorseful for the murders, and wasn’t frightened of death. “There are not enough words to say how sorry I am,” he said then.

Prosecutors have also pursued charges against Deleon’s co-conspirators.

Henderson is serving a sentence of life in prison without the chance of parole for her part in plotting and covering up the crime.

The death sentencing of one of Deleon’s co-conspirators, John Fitzgerald Kennedy is pending, as is the disposition of the case against Alonso Machain, who testified for the prosecution in the Deleon and Kennedy trials.

Charges against another man, Myron Gardner, were dismissed last month, court records show. The gang member was approached to take part in the crime, but declined to participate.

For complete coverage, go to www.ocregister.com/deleon



Contact the writer: (714) 834-3773 or rsrisavasdi@ocregister.com