Jury selection is underway in Flagler County’s first death-penalty trial since the Palm Coast “Ninja Killer” was executed three years ago.
Jermaine Williams Sr., 54, is on trial charged with first-degree premeditated murder in the killing of his wife.
Williams stabbed Yolonda Williams, 50, multiple times outside their home at 408 S. Pine St. in Bunnell Aug. 2, 2024, according to court records.
Yolonda Williams worked at Flagler Cares.
At the time of her murder, Jermaine Williams was on probation for beating her two years earlier.
Jurors selected for the trial will first decide whether Williams is guilty of first-degree murder. If convicted of that charge, the trial will move into a penalty phase in which they will decide whether Williams should face the death penalty.
If at least eight jurors recommend the death penalty, then Circuit Judge Dawn Nichols will decide whether to sentence Williams to death or to life in prison without parole.
If less than eight jurors vote for death, then the judge must sentence Williams to life in prison without parole. If eight or more jurors recommend death, then the judge must give great weight to their recommendation but she is not required to sentence him to death. Nichols could still sentence him to life in prison without parole.
If Nichols sentences Williams to death, he will go on death row and can appeal his conviction and sentence.
And some years down the line, Williams may be led into a room to be executed by lethal injection at Florida State Prison.
‘Ninja Killer,’ who murdered Palm Coast couple, spent 33 years on death row
That is what happened in April 2023 to Louis Bernard Gaskin, also known as the “Ninja Killer.”
But it was not a quick process. Gaskin spent the last 33 years of his life on death row. He was 56 when he was executed.
Gaskin was convicted in 1990 of two counts of first-degree murder in the killings of Robert and Georgette Sturmfels on Dec. 20, 1989.
The Sturmfels were part-time Palm Coast residents from New Jersey who bought a house on Ripley Place where they spent their winters.
It was a time when vacant, wooded lots were much more common in Palm Coast. The city would not even be incorporated until 1999.
Gaskin stood outside the Sturmfels home and shot them with a .22-caliber rifle. Then he broke in and shot them again. He stole some things, some of which he gave to his girlfriend as Christmas presents.
Gaskin was dressed in a black ninja outfit.
On the same night, Gaskin attacked a second couple in the same section of the city. Gaskin cut the phone line to the house. Gaskin then threw wood and rocks on the roof of the house hoping to lure a man out. When Joseph Rector didn’t come out, Gaskin shot him through a window.
When the couple tried to call for help, they found the phone line was dead. But they managed to get in their car and speed away as Gaskin fired at them.
The jury recommended that Gaskin be sentenced to death by a vote of 8-4. At the time, the law called for only seven jurors to vote for death for it to be a death recommendation.
This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Upcoming trial Flagler’s 1st death penalty case since ‘Ninja Killer’
Reporting by Frank Fernandez, Daytona Beach News-Journal / The Daytona Beach News-Journal
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Frank Fernandez, Daytona Beach News-Journal | USA TODAY Network
