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Thread: Dewayne Willie Watkins Sentenced to 2 Consecutive Life Terms in 2018 LA Slaying of Kelly Jose and Heather Jose

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    Dewayne Willie Watkins Sentenced to 2 Consecutive Life Terms in 2018 LA Slaying of Kelly Jose and Heather Jose


    Kelly Jose and Heather Jose





    Caddo DA to seek death for the Jose deaths

    By KTBS News

    SHREVEPORT, La. - A Shreveport man charged with killing a local couple and then burning their bodies in their car late last year will face the death penalty if convicted, the Caddo Parish District Attorney's office says.

    Dewayne Willie Watkins, 34, was indicted February 14, 2019 by the Caddo Parish Grand Jury in connection with the November 8, 2018 robbery, kidnapping and slaying of a Shreveport couple, Kelly Jose, 43, and Heather
    Jose, 32.

    The Joses were found inside a burned car in the Queensborough neighborhood.

    Watkins later was arrested in the 2600 block of Penick Street, two blocks from the burned car, after a nearly six-hour standoff with law-enforcement officers.

    The Caddo Parish DA's office filed its Notice Of Intent To Seek The Death Penalty Monday, March 11, 2019, said Monique Y. Metoyer, section chief of the DA's Homicide Screening Section.

    https://www.ktbs.com/news/caddo-da-t...47e5e1a0a.html
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

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    Caddo DA defends decision to take death penalty off table in murder of couple who gave suspect ride

    By Nancy Cook, Michael Murff and Darran Todd
    arklatexhome.com

    SHREVEPORT, La. (KTAL/KMSS) – The Caddo Parish District Attorney is defending his decision not to seek the death penalty after all in the prosecution of a man accused in the kidnapping and slaying of a local couple who gave him a ride in November 2019.

    Heather Jose was found dead along with her husband, Kelly Jose, on Nov. 8, 2018 inside a burned car in the Queensborough neighborhood. Dewayne Watkins, 34, was later was arrested in the 2600 block of Penick Street, two blocks from the burned car after a nearly six-hour standoff with police.

    Investigators say the couple was murdered after giving a ride to Watkins, who they met while out shopping.

    Watkins was indicted on two counts of first-degree murder in February 2019 and the Caddo District Attorney’s Office filed a Motion of Intent to seek the death penalty in Watkins’ case the following month. This week, the DA’s office took that motion off the table, prompting Heather Jose’s family to release an open letter criticizing the decision.

    “On February 24, 2021, Heather’s family received a phone call that destroyed their hope and belief in justice,” the letter said. “They were notified that District Attorney Stewart had unilaterally decided to drop the death penalty case and only seek life in prison for Watkins. This news devastated Heather’s family. They are being told to accept the fact that Watkins is now being blessed with the opportunity to live out his life, able to receive visits from family and friends, despite the crimes he committed when he sadistically took the lives of two innocent people who showed him kindness. This denial of justice is unacceptable and unethical.”

    The letter lays out in brutal detail how Watkins allegedly stalked the couple through a family outing to Mall St. Vincent, ultimately asking Heather Jose to use her cell phone and asking for a ride before fatally shooting her husband, forcing her to drive to an ATM to empty out her bank account and making her drive to an abandoned house, where he allegedly shot her before setting fire to both their bodies.

    Stewart said a lot has changed since the Motion of Intent was filed.

    In an interview on Wednesday afternoon, Stewart said his decision to take the death penalty off the table was based on the need to get Watkins to trial, coupled with “an influx of new homicide cases during the pandemic,” which he said has backed up trials for a year.

    “Time does not work to the prosecution’s benefit,” Stewart said. He said if the death penalty had remained, the trial would have been delayed, “we’re talking about 2022 or 2023.”

    Stewart also said there were two separate families involved, and though Heather Jose’s family, who released Tuesday’s letter, is in favor of the death penalty, Kelly Jose’s family is not.

    Still, the letter from Heather Jose’s family notes, “They’re not even waiting for the defense attorney to ask for it. They’re dismissing the death penalty all on their own and they’re doing it more than six months before the trial. One has to wonder what the motivation is.”

    “I spoke to both families separately,” Stewart recalled of the initial communications with relatives of the victims about the move to seek the death penalty in the case. “The family in California wanted the death penalty, the other family in east Texas did not want the death penalty for a number of reasons, so we started off at that point.”

    At the time, Stewart knew whatever decision he made regarding the death penalty would please one family while making the other family unhappy. The same is true on his latest decision, only the families are reversed.

    Stewart said before making the decision, he met with prosecutors and though “the facts are egregious,” the decision was not made on emotion, but the DA’s office has had to “adapt to the times.”

    The last death penalty case in Caddo Parish was the October/November 2019 trial of Grover Cannon, who was convicted of first-degree murder in the August 2015 murder of Shreveport Police Officer Thomas LaValley. But during the penalty portion of the trial – a separate trial held after a first-degree murder conviction when the death penalty is an option – the same jury that convicted Cannon voted to sentence him to life in prison.

    With the death penalty off the table, Watkin’s first-degree murder trial is on the docket for Oct. 18, 2021.

    https://www.arklatexhomepage.com/new...-suspect-ride/
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

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    February 9, 2022

    Trial reset for man charged in murder of Shreveport couple

    By Nancy Cook
    arklatexhome.com

    SHREVEPORT, La. (KTAL/KMSS) – The trial of the man accused in the murder of a Shreveport couple whose bodies were found in their burned-out car in November 2018 has been pushed back by nearly six months.

    Willie DeWayne Watkins, 37, was scheduled to go on trial Monday on two counts of first-degree murder for the deaths of 43-year-old Kelly Jose and 33-year-old Heather Jose, but it had to be rescheduled under a court order issues in January postponing all jury trials until at least March 1 due to COVID concerns.

    Watkins’ trial is now set to begin on June 27.

    Watkins has remained in custody since his arrest on Nov. 10, 2018, two days after the couple’s bodies were found inside a burning vehicle in the 3400 block of Penick Street in the Queensborough neighborhood.

    Watkins was arrested after a standoff at his home just two blocks away, after a standoff that lasted nearly six hours.

    Shreveport police say the couple had given Watkins a ride from Mall St. Vincent on the night of the slayings, where they had eaten dinner with their children earlier in the evening.

    The case, which has been winding through Caddo District Court for more than three years, has been the subject of controversy, beginning with a Caddo Parish grand jury upgrading Watkin’s original second-degree murder charges to first-degree murder in a Feb. 14, 2019 indictment.

    After the indictment was handed down, it was unclear whether the Caddo Parish District Attorney’s Office would go for the death penalty. In March 2019, the DA’s office filed a Motion of Intent to seek the death penalty in the event Watkins was convicted.

    But that move slowed progress in the case. Once the death penalty was on the table, the local Indigent Defenders’ Office could no longer represent him. When a defendant faces a possible death penalty in Louisiana, he or she must be represented by death-penalty qualified attorneys. Most, if not all such attorneys in Louisiana are in the southern part of the state.

    At the time, there were so many ongoing death penalty cases in Louisiana that the death-penalty attorneys already had full dance cards, so it took until early May for the appointment of Joseph Vigneri of the Capital Post Conviction Project of New Orleans as lead counsel and Elliot Brown as second-chair.

    The case continued to move slowly toward the trial for the next two years, with periodic appearances to exchange evidence, submit motions, oppositions, and then argue them before the court, giving the judge the information he needed to rule on each one.

    But then, in late February 2021, the DA’s office pulled the death penalty off the table, to the dismay of one of the victim’s families, who were in favor of the death penalty, and to the relief of the other victim’s family, who opposed the death penalty.

    Caddo Parish DA James Stewart cited the need to get Watkins to trial, as well as an influx of new homicide cases during the pandemic, which he said at that point had backed up trials for a year.

    “Time does not work to the prosecution’s benefit,” Stewart told KTAL at the time. He said if the death penalty had remained, the trial would have been delayed, “we’re talking about 2022 or 2023.”

    Since the court order postponing all jury trials in February effectively scrapped Watkins’ trial, Stewart’s intention to speed things up by removing capital punishment may ultimately turn out to be moot.

    Watkins will be back in court on March 31 for arguments and hearings before the late June trial.

    https://www.arklatexhomepage.com/new...ruesome-death/
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

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    Trial underway in kidnapping, murder of Shreveport couple

    By Carolyn Roy
    arklatexhome.com

    SHREVEPORT, La. (KTAL/KMSS) – Jury selection got underway Monday afternoon in the trial of the man accused in the murder of a Shreveport couple whose bodies were found in their burned-out car in November 2018.

    Willie DeWayne Watkins, 37, is charged with two counts of first-degree murder for the deaths of 43-year-old Kelly Jose and 33-year-old Heather Jose.

    Watkins has remained in custody since his arrest on Nov. 10, 2018, two days after the couple’s bodies were found inside a burning vehicle in the 3400 block of Penick Street in the Queensborough neighborhood.

    Watkins was arrested after a standoff at his home just two blocks away, after a standoff that lasted nearly six hours. Shreveport police say the couple had given Watkins a ride from Mall St. Vincent on the night of the slayings, where they had eaten dinner with their children earlier in the evening.

    The case, which has been winding through Caddo District Court for more than three years, has been delayed multiple times, starting with the Caddo Parish grand jury upgrading Watkin’s original second-degree murder charges to first-degree murder in a Feb. 14, 2019 indictment. The trial had to be rescheduled in February 2022 under a court order issued in January postponing all jury trials until at least March 1 due to COVID concerns.

    It has also been the subject of controversy after the Caddo Parish District Attorney initially moved to seek the death penalty in the case only to take the death penalty off the table in early 2021 in an effort to move the case along.

    Jury selection is expected to continue Tuesday. If convicted, Watkins faces life in prison.

    https://www.arklatexhomepage.com/new...veport-couple/
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

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    WATKINS MURDER TRIAL RESET FOR AUGUST AFTER MISTRIAL DECLARED

    By Caddo Parish District Attorney's Office

    A mistrial was declared Wednesday, June 29, 2022, in the case of Dewayne Willie Watkins, on trial for the double first-degree murder of a local couple almost four years ago.

    Judge John D. Mosely Jr. declared the mistrial after it was learned that an attorney involved tested positive for COVID-19, and a key witness also was symptomatic. Contact tracing could have led to other potential quarantines. No recess was possible due to witness and juror availabilities. State prosecutors and defense attorneys agreed to the mistrial and a new trial date, August 22, 2022.

    Jury selection was in its second day in the case of Watkins, 37, accused in the November 8, 2018 slayings of Heather Angela King Jose, 32, and her husband, Kelly Dean Jose, 43. The two were found burned beyond recognition in a vehicle in the carport of a vacant home in the 3400 block of Penick Street in the Queensborough neighborhood.

    Watkins was arrested several days after the slayings following a six-hour standoff with police.

    https://www.caddoda.com/2022/06/30/w...rial-declared/

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    Edited:

    Jury selection begins in Jose double murder trial

    By Nancy Cook and Carolyn Roy
    ArkLaTex Homepage

    SHREVEPORT, La. (KTAL/KMSS) – Jury selection began Monday in the trial of the Shreveport man charged in the 2018 deaths of a couple who gave him a ride from a local mall.

    Jury selection originally began June 26, but the trial was shut down three days later after a COVID outbreak and re-scheduled for August 22.

    The case, which has been winding through Caddo District Court for more than three years, has been delayed multiple times, starting with the Caddo Parish grand jury upgrading Watkin’s original second-degree murder charges to first-degree murder in a Feb. 14, 2019 indictment. The trial had to be rescheduled in February 2022 under a court order issued in January postponing all jury trials until at least March 1 due to COVID concerns.

    It has also been the subject of controversy after the Caddo Parish District Attorney initially moved to seek the death penalty in the case only to take the death penalty off the table in early 2021 in an effort to move the case along.

    Jury selection is expected to continue Tuesday morning. If convicted, Watkins faces life in prison.

    https://www.arklatexhomepage.com/new...ath-of-couple/
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

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    Watkins' double murder trial nears end

    By KPVI News

    SHREVEPORT, La. -- Closing arguments will take place Wednesday morning in the double first-degree murder trial of Dewayne Willie Watkins.

    The state rested its case Tuesday afternoon. The trial started Aug. 29 in Caddo District Judge John Mosely's courtroom.

    Watkins, 37, of Shreveport, is charged with the November 2018 robbery and slayings of Kelly Jose, 43, and his wife, Heather, 32. Prosecutors said the couple were leaving Mall St. Vincent that night when Watkins approached and asked to use Heather Jose’s cellphone.

    The couple, described by friends and family as trusting and generous, agreed to give him a ride. Their bodies were later found in a burning car outside an abandoned house on Penick Street. Watkins, who faces mandatory life in prison if convicted as charged, has pleaded not guilty.

    Kelly Jose was a civilian employee at Barksdale Air Force Base and an Air Force reservist. Heather Jose moved to the Shreveport area from California when she married him.

    There have been four trial dates in Watkins’ case -- which started out as a capital-punishment case before prosecutors decided against seeking the death penalty -- and has involved dozens of motions by defense attorneys.

    https://www.kpvi.com/news/national_n...7fac5fcd3.html
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

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    Watkins trial: Jury finds DeWayne Watkins guilty in deaths of Heather and Kelly Joses

    By Nancy Cook and Carolyn Roy
    ArkLaTex Homepage

    SHREVEPORT, La. (KTAL/KMSS) – A Caddo Parish jury has found 37-year-old DeWayne Watkins guilty on two counts of first-degree murder in the Nov. 8, 2018 deaths of Heather and Kelly Jose.

    The verdict comes four weeks and two days after the trial of the 37-year-old Watkins began, though it was recessed four days after the first day of jury selection after Watson tested positive for COVID.

    Watkins was accused of shooting the couple who offered him a ride home from Mall St. Vincent only to be kidnapped, robbed, shot in the backs of their heads, and then burning their bodies inside their car in the driveway of a vacant home in the Queensborough neighborhood.

    It took the jury just over an hour of deliberations to bring back the guilty verdict, which followed a very long day of attorneys quibbling about the judge’s instructions to the jury and closing arguments, which began just before 1 p.m. Wednesday and concluded almost three hours later.

    The judge, attorneys and families were alerted that the jury had reached a verdict and had silently entered the courtroom around 5:20 p.m.

    Presiding Judge John Mosely entered about five minutes later and then the jury was brought in. After the judge asked the jury foreman if a verdict had been reached and received an affirmative answer, the paper on which the verdict was written was handed to the clerk of court who read the verdicts out loud.

    As the first guilty of first-degree murder in the death of Kelly Jose was read, a gasp could be heard from the row second row which was filled with Heather Jose’s family, and when the second guilty verdict in Heather’s death was read, her sister Sarah Sharp quietly sobbed in her father, Mel King’s arms.

    Heather Jose’s family attended the trial from August 22, the day it began, and were right back in the courtroom on August 29 when court resumed after a four-day recess called after the defendant was diagnosed with COVID on the evening of the first day of jury selection.

    The family, Heather’s father, her sisters, and her aunts and uncles were faithful throughout the trial. After the verdicts were read, the families talked about their devotion to Heather and how they were determined to see the trial through, regardless of how painful.

    Yet through their pain, the family spoke with pride about Heather and the amazing life she lived in her 32 years. Her father laughed as he recalled when Heather, fresh out of college, decided to go to New Orleans, which had just experienced Hurricane Katrina.

    He said he tried to be logical with his daughter, asking her if she knew anyone there, and where she would stay when she got there. She didn’t know, she told him. So he asked her what she was going to do there. She answered with one word, “Help.”

    Another time, she took off to New York City to work on the streets with a Christian group for the same reason. To help.

    So, it’s no wonder that when DeWayne Willie Watkins said he needed a ride, and Heather couldn’t get a cab for him, she and Kelly offered him a ride home.

    But rather than be bitter, her dad, sisters, aunts and uncles, who relived Heather and Kelly’s death day-after-day in the trial, said now that Watkins can never hurt anyone again, they will begin the long road to forgiveness.

    Because that’s what Heather would do.

    All of them, Heather’s sisters and father, as well as the Johnsons and the Kings, aunts and uncles who have sat through the trial every day, say they plan to spend the rest of their lives honoring Heather. They all agreed that Heather died doing someone a favor, so that is how they plan to live out their lives.

    Wednesday evening, as the family left the courthouse they talked about their gratitude to the judge, who has presided over what has been a very lengthy and difficult case, the Caddo District Attorney’s office and prosecutors Bill Edwards and Mekeisha Creal.

    They also expressed gratitude to the jury, who almost for three weeks sat in the jury box listening to mountains of evidence put on by the state, as well as cross examinations by defense attorneys Sean Collins and Mariah Holder.

    A conviction on two counts of first-degree murder is punishable by life in prison or the death penalty, but Caddo District Attorney James Stewart took the death penalty off the table in 2021 in an effort to move the case along.

    Watkins will be formally sentenced on Oct. 19. The Kings and Johnsons plan to fly back to Shreveport from California for the sentencing.

    https://www.arklatexhomepage.com/new...-murder-trial/
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

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    2018 killer of Shreveport couple will spend the rest of his life behind bars

    By Alexandria Savage
    KSLA

    SHREVEPORT, La. (KSLA) - Dewayne Watkins appeared in court for sentencing Wednesday, Oct. 19.

    Watkins was found guilty in September of the double murder of Kelly and Heather Jose, which happened in 2018. The 34-year-old was accused of kidnapping, robbing, then killing the Shreveport couple after they gave him a ride from Mall St. Vincent. Their bodies were found in a burned car in the Queensborough area.

    Watkins was charged with two counts of first-degree murder. On Wednesday, he was sentenced to two consecutive life terms in prison.

    https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.ksl...outputType=amp

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