BLACK SOCIAL HISTORY : AFRICAN AMERICAN " JESSIE VAN DAVIS " WAS STAB TO DEATH IN A FIGHT WITH VAZQUES WHO WAS FOUND GUILTY OF SECOND DEGREE MURDER : GOES INTO THE " HALL OF BLACK HROES "

BLACK     SOCIAL   HISTORY                                                                                                                                                         Vazquez guilty of second degree murder of Jessie Van Davis

AISLING SWIFT

 

                                                                                                                                                           

 Circuit jury deliberated two hours Friday night before finding an East Naples man guilty of stabbing a former St. John Neumann High football star to death five years ago.

The three-man, three-woman Collier Circuit jury heard three days of testimony before finding 23-year-old Adonis Vazquez guilty of second-degree murder in the death of Jessie Van Davis Jr., 20, who died of a stab wound to the chest outside his mother's home at Tuscan Isle apartments in East Naples, on Nov. 11, 2008.

He died while home on a break from his freshman year of college at the University of Dubuque in Iowa, where he played junior varsity football on a football scholarship.

Collier Circuit Judge Ramiro Mañalich ordered a presentencing report. No sentencing date was set.

Court records indicate Vazquez has a juvenile record, but that's not public. He has no adult convictions, but racked up arrests while out on bond for this crime, including a break-in to a car, theft of credit cards, attempted illegally using credit cards. After he was returned to jail, he and his jail cellmate, Rodsheek Williams, were charged with enlisting Williams' fellow gang members to threaten witnesses in Vazquez's murder case.

That trial is set for January.

No one saw the actual stabbing, but witnesses said it occurred after Davis called out to a girl on a third-floor balcony, upsetting Vazquez, who said it was his girlfriend, then got up and ran downstairs to confront him.

They fought, the girlfriend, Mary Williamson, jumped between them and got hit in the head as Davis swung at Vazquez, who left her on the ground and pursued Davis toward the parking lot. It was there witnesses and his mother and friend found him bleeding, gasping for breath, before he died minutes later.

The medical examiner testified he had five sharp-force wounds, including to his back and a deep cut to his heart.