I dated Melanie for a short while before she and Keith started dating. I hung out with both of them, separately and together, on many occasions. RIP

Supreme Court of Florida.

Jason LOONEY, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee.


No. SC00-458.

Decided: November 01, 2001

Barbara Sanders, Apalachicola, FL, for Appellant. Robert A. Butterworth, Attorney General, and Carolyn M. Snurkowski, Assistant Attorney General, Tallahassee, FL, for Appellee.
We have on appeal the judgment and sentence of the trial court imposing the death penalty upon Jason Looney.   We have jurisdiction.   See art. V, § 3(b)(1), Fla. Const.   For the reasons that follow, we affirm the judgment and sentence.

In the early morning hours of July 27, 1997, the charred bodies of Melanie King and Robin Keith Spears were found in the victims' burning home in Wakulla County, Florida.   Looney, Guerry Hertz, and Jimmy Dempsey were each indicted for the first-degree murders of the victims, and each codefendant was also charged with burglary of a dwelling while armed, armed robbery with a firearm, arson of a dwelling, and use of a firearm during the commission of a felony as a result of this incident.   Prior to trial, codefendant Dempsey negotiated a plea with the State and was sentenced to consecutive life sentences in return for providing his testimony at Looney and Hertz's joint trial.

The evidence presented at the trial revealed the following facts.   At approximately 11 p.m. on July 26, 1997, Looney and his codefendants left an acquaintance's house on foot within walking distance from the victims' home.   All three men were armed with guns. A resident who lived about 500 yards from the victims testified that Hertz appeared at her door at about 2 a.m. asking to use her phone because “his truck had broken down.”   When she refused, the trio continued down the road towards the victims' home and, upon seeing the victims' black Mustang, Looney said, “There's my car right there.   That's the one I want.”

Dempsey and Hertz went to the victims' front door as a decoy and asked if they could use the phone.   King provided them with a cordless phone, and Dempsey feigned making a phone call.   When Dempsey attempted to return the phone, Hertz pointed his gun at King and forced his way in.   Looney then entered and pointed his rifle at Spears.   Spears and King were bound and gagged with duct tape and placed face down on their bed.   Looney and his codefendants removed a significant amount of the victims' property, including a VCR, a television, jewelry, furniture, and CDs, and loaded the victims' belongings into the victims' two vehicles.   Looney also found approximately $1500 of the victims' money in an envelope, which was ultimately divided equally among the three.

Looney and Hertz concluded that they could leave no witnesses and informed Dempsey of their decision.   Dempsey said Looney and Hertz then poured accelerants throughout the victims' home.   All three men, still armed, went to the bedroom where the victims were bound, side-by-side, face down on their bed.   When they entered the back bedroom, King said that she would “rather die being burnt up than shot.”   She stated, “Please, God, don't shoot me in the head.”   Hertz replied, “Sorry, can't do that,” and then he proceeded to open fire; ?Looney followed and then Dempsey.   The victims died as a result of the gunshot wounds.

Subsequent to the shootings, the victims' home was set ablaze.   Hertz drove away in the victims' white Ford Ranger, and Looney drove the victims' black Ford Mustang, with Dempsey as a passenger.   According to Dempsey, the whole episode at the victims' home lasted about two hours.   The trio proceeded to Hertz's house and unloaded the stolen items and divided up the money.   Two employees at the Wal-Mart in Tallahassee testified that the three men made purchases at the store at around 5 a.m. the morning of the murders, before “showing off” their new vehicles, i.e., a black Mustang and a white Ford Ranger, to both of the employees.   A Wal-Mart receipt for a clothing purchase was later found in the victims' Mustang, corroborating the employees' testimony.

Looney and his codefendants made their way to Daytona Beach Shores where, later that day, they were involved in a pursuit and shootout with police.   Looney and Dempsey were arrested after abandoning and fleeing from the victims' black Mustang.   Hertz abandoned the victims' Ford Ranger after being shot, and he paid a cabdriver $100 to drive him to his aunt's house in St. Augustine.   Hertz was arrested that same day in St. Augustine, and victim Spears' .9mm gun was recovered from Hertz's bag.

A firearms expert with FDLE testified that one of the bullets recovered from the area of the victims' burned bed was fired from the .380 Lorcin handgun recovered from Looney at the time of his arrest in Daytona Beach, i.e., the same handgun owned by Keith Spears and used, according to Dempsey, by Hertz to shoot the victims. The other bullet was fired from a .30 caliber carbine rifle, not inconsistent with .30 caliber rifle used by Looney to shoot the victims, and later recovered in the victims' Mustang.   A roll of duct tape, Looney's wallet with $464, and Dempsey's wallet with $380 were also found in the Mustang.   A fingerprint analyst with FDLE analyzed latent fingerprints taken from the Mustang and concluded that Looney and his codefendants had all touched the car.   The chemist found evidence of various accelerants on items of clothing found in the Mustang.   In addition, a law enforcement investigator with the State Fire Marshal's Office testified that the kind of damage that was done by the fire does not happen unless an accelerant is used.

The state medical examiner testified that the bodies were severely burned.   He graphically detailed the condition of the bodies as depicted in the photographs: ?the legs were burned off below the knees, the hands were burned to nubs, the bones of the arms were fractured by the fire, and the skulls were burned partially away.   The victims had to be positively identified by dental records.   The medical examiner also testified that there could have been other injuries that were not detected due to the extensive burns.

King was shot at least two times in the head, which caused her death.   However, the medical examiner was not able to trace the path of the bullet because the skull was burned away.   He testified that it was possible that other bullets struck the body, which could not be determined because of the fire.   King lived one to two minutes after she was shot.   However, there was no soot in the trachea, indicating that she was not alive when the fire started.   Spears was shot at least one time in the head, which caused his death.   The bullet went in the back of the neck and exited above the right eye.   Spears also lived one to two minutes after he was shot, and again, no soot was discovered in his trachea, meaning that he was dead at the time of the fire.   The defense did not present any evidence.

Not reading in 8 pages to say I had an old high school acquaintance who's dad taught us to shoot pool on his pool table in his garage...and got stabbed to death at a dive bar on 11th St (streewalking whore territory of North Tulsa) when he followed some welchers into the parking lot after they lost a game of pool with him

Never caught the stabber(s). I wont call them the perps for obvious reasons

I'm more amazed by the number of people I know who died under very questionable circumstances but no one was ever investigated their deaths for mostly lazy or incompetent reasons

Yes, childhood friend. Later we are both 19 in different states going to school and working part time gas station job pumping gas. Mom tells me on the phone Lee was shot dead working in front of the pumps and asked me how my job was going and if it was worth it. The guy I worked for a weird person in general and was later shot and robbed closing his gas station as he collected the money from the drop safe.

I did know a murderer for about 2 years and used to drink beer with him on occasion. Then one day back in 2018 about 100 LEO surrounded my neighbors garden and took him down. My neighbors to this day think he is totally innocent and evidence was planted.


https://lawandcrime.com/crime/where-did-you-dump-loris-body-alabama-man-convicted-of-capital-murder-in-death-of-woman-who-went-missing-in-2006/

They found a guy tied up in a vacant house in my old neighborhood years ago.  He wasn't technically murdered until no one found him and he died down there to be found weeks later.

Yes, a girl I knew from high school paid another dude to kill her husband.  The dude did it and they both are in jail.  The husband was a really nice person.

I was going to say "no one" but then I remembered. My second grade teacher was killed by her husband,  probably about 5 years after we moved from the area. I've got no details,  and he's been out so long he's not in the inmate database from the state. Did she smile at the wrong man? Did he drink and go on a rampage?  Just don't know.

several of mine were from Drug Deal issues in SE OK in the early days of Meth. 2 of those were very close friends and some of the nicest guys you would have ever wanted to be around. I miss them to this day - 25 years later. 1 was the in the middle of the back seat between 2 guys with the dealers driving in the front when the dealer in the front passenger seat turned around Pulp Fiction style and shot my friend right between the eyes with my other friends looking stunned thinking they were next.

1 was a murder-suicide. she was taken way too soon in a vicious way by an Ex as she was leaving work.

1 was shot in an Armed Robbery of a BBQ joint after closing.

1 Dr was shot and killed by his wife in the Garage after coming home from his girlfriends house. 2 trials finally got a Murder 2 conviction.

one of my wife's employee's at the hospital left work one afternoon and never went to pick up her little boy. she disappeared off the face of the earth. she was a devoted mother and never would have left him. LEO's have told us for years that she is dead. my wife and I still talk about her and the situation after 10-15 years.


I know 4 guys who have been no billed for shooting people.
1 defending an Armed Robbery in a parking lot. he shot him with a .38.
1 defending from a Burglary in his house. he shot him as he climbed in the bathroom window with a shotgun.
1 defending himself from his girlfriends  ex husband in a home invasion situation. he shot him with a shotgun as soon as he broke thru the front door.

1 man has killed 2 Armed Robbers and wounded 2 more in his Liquor Store in 4 different robberies. ( he killed one man with a sawed off shotgun, thru the front door before he opened it. he shot as soon as he saw the pistol in his hand)

My best friend was murdered on a beach in Sanibel Island in 1994
They caught the bastard who was high at the time

Another close friend murdered in Los Angeles in 1986 by a deranged ex boyfriend of a girl he was seeing

@DmacRTCo

Mark Porter?? He was my HS principal my freshman year.

for 30 years, my father kept track of all the murders he knew of in SE OK.
by his calculations there was only about a 10-15% solving rate, with the only solving being done if the person admitted to it or did it in the company of others and the witnesses gave the statement.

  When I was a child my next door neighbor shot & killed his wife and tried to do the same to his daughter. He hit her in the back of the neck with the .38 slug , she survived.

  Just after high school had a friend stabbed in the back with a beer bottle, he bled out in his driveway while his wife was watching tv.

  One of my uncles pulled a knife on my other uncle who had a shotgun in hand. 1 less uncle ....

  The uncle thing was before I was born

@wump

Yep, that was the guy. His name seemed familiar when I heard the news so I’m not sure if he passed through my hometown at some point and I just didn’t remember him.
Gary Tyrell was my principal in middle school in the early 90s.
ETA: I just googled it and can’t believe that was actually eight years ago already. Damn.

I wonder what work they did or what kind of associations they had.

I'm not understanding that sentence. Please clarify.

Yes, I knew a kid that was stabbed and killed by a scumbag. A quiet, decent, good kid from a good family.

Literally for a dollar.

Move your family away from filth when your neighborhood goes bad. I learned that lesson and applied it with vigor.

Hughie Harley

Growing up in the Bronx taught me many things, I continue to apply the lessons learned every day. Fuck the ghetto and the denizens that inhabit it.

I'm interpreting that as he knows 4 people involved in shootings that were not indicted by the grand juries that heard the facts of the cases.

Guy I knew through work was stabbed 16 times by his POS stepson over $40

he was able to get to the bathroom and lock the door to get away from the kid but didn't have his phone and bled out alone trying to get away from the kid.
everyone had written the kid off even his mother but he never gave up on the kid even after he had divorced his mother several years earlier.
the kid continued to stay at the house for several days until a welfare check discovered the body

I wonder if they were justified shootings or crimes they were not indicted for.

4 or 5 come to mind. No close friends or relatives.

A couple drug related (wife's doc and another guy who was a co-worker), a domestic violence murder suicide, a home burglary.

In the middle of the night home burglary, a guy I knew was shot killed and another guy shot and wounded. The wounded guy played dead and heard the killers talking about getting a knife in the kitchen to make sure; the gunshots were too noisy.
He then got  a 1911 and hit one of the murderers in the ankle. They fled and were caught.

I can't fathom how a doc gets killed over drugs. Perhaps a patient thought he wasn't prescribing enough opiods?

Another one I remember was I had a foster brother who later on became a gun collector of sorts.  Some folks came over and decided to do a home invasion on him and his girlfriend.  They got in somehow and were able to tie up Patrick and his girlfriend and rip him off.  The robbers left and Patrick and his GF were able to free themselves right before one of the robbers decided to come back and finish the job.  Patrick met him with a sawed off 12 gauge shotgun and blew him away.  It was a good shoot but Patrick did get in a bit of trouble over the possession of the sawed off shotgun.  It was in the LA Times when it happened but I can't find the article now.

Not to get off track . I will share mine. Guy I knew since kindergarten and grew up with apparently was a very good drug dealer and didnt use. On our graduation trip I heard through the news he had shot someone in a parking garage in destin in 2005. I think he got stood up for the cash and dope and decided fuck it . As far as I know he is still in prison. I also was present when a woman was executed. I managed to save the other hostage by pulling him out of the door and running. She got free of her boyfriend and turned other way out door and was killed about 100 yards from us. Killer is at Angola . A nurse I worked with and talked to all the time apparently had a secret girlfriend from his wife. He drove to Lake Charles and took girlfriend hostage. Called his wife at work who I also knew and was a nurse and proceeded to tell her why he cheated on her and then shot girlfriend and himself on phone where she could hear it.

not charged either by the DA or Grand Jury.

every one one them was justified. self defense and defense of the home or business

1 defending an Armed Robbery in a parking lot. he shot him with a .38.
1 defending from a Burglary in his house. he shot him as he climbed in the bathroom window with a shotgun.
1 defending himself from his girlfriends  ex husband in a home invasion situation. he shot him with a shotgun as soon as he broke thru the front door.

1 man has killed 2 Armed Robbers and wounded 2 more in his Liquor Store in 4 different robberies. ( he killed one man with a sawed off shotgun, thru the front door before he opened it. he shot as soon as he saw the pistol in his hand)

Yes my friend Janice, She was 19, her ex boyfriend shot her in the head with a Lee Enfield.

The sawed off shotgun is Class III, IIRC. I guess he sawed it off himself without getting permission, paying the tax, and getting the tax stamp.

@OKnativeson: Thanks.

It's disheartening reading about innocent people getting killed.

Ain't that the truth.

Apparently he lead a double life.
Doc by day and drug dealer by night.
Met him several times when he treated my wife and he was completely under the radar.
I was shocked when he was killed.

https://www.oregonlive.com/washingtoncounty/2010/03/washington_county_arrest_man_i.html

https://www.oregonlive.com/north-of-26/2017/03/aggravated_murder_conviction_o.html

@peacematu

This.  Many of both.  This is one of the most awful.https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/McKinney_quadruple_murder

Dr. Rhoden?

A cousin.  I was very young at the time.  She was shot in the neck with a shotgun sitting in her car by a pissed off husband.  Right outside of a bar in Dixie Highway call Sparkies.  Word is she was f---ing with his marriage in some way.

Think he only got two years out of it...

I knew four(five?) people who were murdered. Although one was when I was younger and I was friends with her sons so I didn’t know her other than as my friends mom.  The husband did her in.

A former classmate was murdered last year.  Shot dead in front of her husband by some gang bangers who were shooting at someone else.  They had just come out of a restaurant in Chicago.

A gal I went on a few dates with was murdered a few years later by some shit head boyfriend or something.  

Another gal friend had her throat slit by some crazy jealous fuck.

All were caught except the fuckheads in Chicago.

Edit - possible fifth.

Girl I was with once was possibly killed by her boyfriend.  He was threatening to kill her and shit weeks before she died.  She was shot in the head in the garage and he reported her missing.  Somehow he didn’t think to check for the garage?… unlikely but he ended up not being charged.

Guy I went to high school with, shot his girlfriend, the mother of his four kids.  Last bullet was in the head out in the street.  Oddly enough, his dad was the local PD communications/media officer.  

He ended up dying in prison.  Sad story.  Craig was a humble, quiet guy.

http://www.mydeathspace.com/article/2008/08/14/Kyishi_Dowdell_(31)_Was_shot_to_death_outside_her_home_by_her_abusive_ex_boyfriend

Yes. 2003. Coworker was Shot by his father in law. Fil then shot himself

My father's fiance was murdered in his home. The weapon was a Chef Knife. The perp was an Illegal Alien from El Salvador who was working as a laborer on the house that was being remodeled next door. This happened back in 1990....he was sentenced to Death Row...where he sat eating meals and receiving medical care until he died from Natural Causes in 2020. This was in California.

My Dad spent years in therapy trying to overcome his PTSD...he found her body. My late sister and I went down to his house and cleaned up the blood left behind. It happened in the utility room next to the Kitchen. The door had a dead bolt that required a key to unlock it from both the inside and outside...she was trapped and couldn't escape the guy.

The Autopsy report came out during the Trial..they guy cut off both of her breasts and other parts of her...she died slowly and painfully as he toyed with her.
There was dried sticky blood everywhere..even on the ceiling and there were flies all over it.
Parts of the door were cut off in order to remove evidence...bloody palm prints and shoe prints everywhere.

She was 33 years old. A really nice lady.
It happened in a very upscale neighborhood...not some inner city slum.

My point is: just because you live in a nice area...doesn't mean it won't happen to you and your family.
Security is critical as is having a dog to buy you some time to get to your loaded gun.
Good security has multiple layers.

A guy I knew in high school was murdered his senior year in a Chic-Fil-A in West Palm Beach in 1999.

https://www.law.umich.edu/special/exoneration/Pages/casedetail.aspx?caseid=4510

a few more

One of my regular patrons of my Texas dancehall had a g/f who was married.  They had a smooth relationship for years and seemed to have something worked out with the husband who may have had a g/f himself.
One evening when he picked up his g/f to come dancing at my club, the husband gut shot him once with a .38.  Earl just sat on the front steps waiting for the ambulance but was DOA.

Another time a kid I worked with was kind of wild, but funny and acted like, well, a twentysomething.  Just a couple years later I saw on the news he'd been murdered over some kind of a pissant drug deal in the house he was renting with a friend.

Also, my gunsmith was going through a divorce and had his own place on a piece of property.  Somehow an argument transpired with the ex and her new b/f.  The story goes the new b/f  shot him in self defense, but I've had someone with inside info say they just set him up and killed him.  He was a great machinist and scratch built a beautiful '32 Ford roadster from the frame up.

Appreciate the stories, can't believe how people can do stuff like this.  

To even have life here on Earth is such an extremely rare thing in the context of the solar system, yet people kill or get killed over the most trivial of circumstances. Why, I'll never understand.

Never met him, but great uncle was beaten to death and robbed of his jewelry

Guy I knew growing up was killed in drive by shooting.  Know another guy that killed someone in a different drive by

Met the Austin Bomber's dad a couple of times.

Elementary substitute teacher, super nice lady

Beat to death with a hammer while her kid was tied up.



https://nypost.com/2017/12/13/just-shoot-me-suspects-in-teachers-murder-asked-cops-to-end-it-all/

My uncle was George Floyd'ed by the local sheriff's department 20 years ago. I guess technically he was "murdered" Nothing ever happened to the deputies that stood on his back.

I went to high school with a couple guys that beat one of their mothers to death with a shovel because she wouldn't let them borrow her car. I didn't really know either of them very well. At the time I worked in a chicken restaurant and they came in that night and covered the whole table in ketchup, it was my night off. About 1998 / 1999

"No bill" usually means "cleared, no crime committed", IIRC.

Lost another friend in 1988.

He was in the wholesale car business and became very successful.

Unfortunately, he dressed the part with a Rolex and jewelry.

After leaving the Houston auction one night he was followed home by two perps who approached his car as it stopped in his home driveway.

He drew his handgun and shot at one through his driver's side window, but one of the perps shot him through the neck with a small caliber handgun.

They bailed as he made it to his front porch.

He bled out in his wife's arms.

I'd known them both since elementary school.

Back in Higb School I was dating Christa Hoyts sister when she was murdered.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.miamiherald.com/news/state/florida/article234350257.html

Yes,
Boss was died after intervening in a fight in a pub.

One of the guys took offence and waited for him to leave the pub he’d gone and got some friends 4 jumped him and he hit his head on the floor.