JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Johnathan Quiles entered the courtroom for day one of his death penalty case Thursday smiling broadly, a casual manner he’s shown throughout much of the case.
Prosecutors painted a much darker picture of Quiles, that of a predatory killer who murdered his niece in cold blood to cover up the fact that he’d impregnated her.
Quiles is charged with murdering 16-year-old Iyana Sawyer and her unborn baby girl in 2018. He has pleaded not guilty. After three days of jury selection, Assistant State Attorney Stacie French opened the case by quoting from an exchange between Quiles and his biological brother, Joseph, as well as statements made on a recorded wire:
Quiles: The girl might be pregnant. I can’t lose my family if she has the baby. I have to get rid of the body.
What was her name?
Quiles: Iyana. She was 16. She was pregnant – five months. I talked my niece into running away... had her come to my job, Ace Pick A Part on North Main Street.
Why your job?
The Dumpster’s at my job. I control what gets dumped.
Did you kill her one day and dump her body the next?
Yes, they’re going to give me the needle.
Why?
One: premeditated murder. Two: young adult with an unborn child – five months. They consider that, too.
Did you shoot her? Did you shoot her in the head?
No, not head, heart.
Addressing the jury, Quiles' attorney Robert Davis said of prosecutors, “These are great people with a very tough job. But that doesn’t mean that they don’t have to meet their burden. The crime, as you can see, is that of premeditated first-degree murder. They have to prove Mr. Quiles is the person who killed Iyana Sawyer and her unborn child. They have to prove that. They also have to show that he premeditated it in such a way to prove this was a heinous crime. The state will not be able to meet that burden.”
Davis noted that Sawyer's body was never found, nor was any blood.
The first witness was Kimberly Mobley, Iyana’s mother. She described her daughter as a straight A student, a “homebody,” who only ever spent the night at home or at her aunt Naomi Mobley’s house. At the time Mobley was married to Quiles.
Kimberly Mobley said she “was a little upset at first” when she learned her daughter was pregnant, but said “as soon as I felt that baby kick” she determined she would support the pregnancy. “She wanted to [have the baby],” Mobley testified. At the time Iyana disappeared, she was five months pregnant and had picked a name for the girl, “Hazel Michelle Mobley.”
The teen’s grandmother, Winella Haynes, testified after lunch. She said initially Quiles “was a good uncle ... a cool uncle.”
That view changed at a family gathering when she walked in on Quiles hugging Iyana in an intimate embrace.
“He had his hand wrapped around her body,” Haynes said. “When I walked out[side], his reaction when I come out -- he jumped. I startled him.”
She said after that night, she spoke to Iyana’s mother, Kimberly Mobley, and told her, “it might be wise” not to allow Quiles to be alone with Iyana. Her daughter heeded that advice. “Kim told him: ‘Don’t be around my children when I’m not around.’”
But she said Quiles knew Mobley’s work schedule and still came around when she was not home.
The trial is expected to last into the middle of next week.