JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — A Jacksonville woman was sentenced to 35 years in prison Friday for the second degree murder of a teen in 2020 at a Westside Wawa location.
Shaetavia Cooper, 27, was found guilty in July after a mistrial was declared in her 2023 trial for the 2020 second-degree murder of Teneria McClendon, 16. Cooper shot McClendon at the Wawa on Wilson Boulevard near Lane Avenue South on July 18, 2020.
Cooper and the teen were strangers, police said. The arrest report said during the altercation in the checkout line, McClendon spat in Cooper's direction but never "punched, kicked or pushed" Cooper.
Cooper's defense claimed that she shot McClendon to protect herself, telling jurors at her first trial that she feared for her life when she got into an argument with a group of women, including McClendon.
The state said that McClendon was protecting her mother, who was pregnant at the time, during the argument. Prosecutors said Cooper escalated the conflict unnecessarily; Cooper was seen on surveillance footage going to her car to retrieve a gun and returning to the Wawa.
At her 2023 trial, Assistant State Attorney, LeTesha Campbell showed the video of Cooper walking to her car and grabbing her purse with the gun inside. Campbell asked Cooper why she went back into the Wawa.
Campbell: "You were in fear for your life?"
Cooper: "Yes, ma'am."
Campbell: "Okay, because you fear that - of what? You were fearing that something might happen?"
Cooper: "That they were going to harm me. Yes ma'am."
Campbell: "Okay, but did anyone harm you? "
Cooper: "No, ma'am."
Campbell: "Did you anybody touch you? "
Cooper: "No, ma'am."
Cooper said the girls continued to argue with her while she was going back inside to get her food at Wawa.
“They followed me to my car in the process of me getting my ID so in that moment I started backing up, and I was in fear for my life and I didn’t know what to do so I pulled my gun out and put it by my side and I told them to leave me alone," Cooper said in 2023.
Cooper's sentence will be followed by 10 years probation.
