Vicky Renee Newton~~5/01/1964-7/10/
Family finally faces girl's killer at hearing
After finding her missing sister on the Internet, a woman confronts the man convicted of killing the girl.
By RICHARD DANIELSON
© St. Petersburg Times, published June 5, 1999
TAMPA -- It took more than 15 years to identify the Jane Doe whose nude body was found near Floriland Mall in 1983 as Vickey Renee Newton of Texas. On Friday, Newton's family came to Tampa to give her a voice as well as a name.
In a Hillsborough County courtroom, Sharron Hawkins faced Vincent R. Quevedo, who has confessed to smothering Newton, and held up three sheets of paper. One was the missing person's sketch of Newton that Mrs. Hawkins found on the Internet this year. The next was the autopsy photo she used to identify her sister. The last was a portrait of a smiling, blond 15-year-old Vickey Newton.
"This is how I found my sister," Mrs. Hawkins said as she held up the missing person's sketch. "This is what you did to her, and this is what she was before you had her."
Her husband, Jeff Hawkins, said he fears for the safety of his teenage daughters because of people like Quevedo. "There's no remorse . . . in your face at all. None," Hawkins said. "You killed somebody and got away with it."
Almost.
Quevedo, 34, faces up to 15 years in prison for violating his probation on a 1984 manslaughter conviction in Newton's death. In a high, thin voice, Quevedo admitted Friday that he skipped out on his seven years of probation, but his attorney asked Circuit Judge Cynthia Holloway for another hearing at which he can present evidence supporting a less severe sentence. Holloway scheduled that hearing for June 30.
The June 30 hearing could end years of uncertainty that began the day in 1982 that Newton called her grandmother and said she was leaving the Dallas area with two bikers who were headed to Arkansas and then to Florida.
"She was always a sweet little girl, and she was very naive," Mrs. Hawkins said outside the courtroom Friday.
Newton, then just 17, had been married briefly, but had never given her family any sign that she wanted to leave Texas. Her call to her grandmother was the last that the family knew of her -- until this year.
In January, Mrs. Hawkins was looking at photos on the Web site for the Missing Children Help Center, when she saw a Tampa Police Department drawing of a Jane Doe found in Floriland Mall's parking lot in July 1983. The bulletin said the young woman's body had burn scars on the hands and thighs, matching Newton's injuries from a childhood accident.
Quevedo was charged with killing the unidentified woman in 1983 and had confessed to suffocating her to keep her quiet as the two had sex in his car, then dumping her body, taking money from her purse and throwing the handbag in the Hillsborough River.
Police said at the time that Quevedo was charged with second-degree murder because there was no evidence of premeditation. They described the then-unknown woman as a "short-time acquaintance" of Quevedo.
With little physical evidence and few witnesses, he managed to plead guilty to a reduced charge of manslaughter. State sentencing guidelines called for a prison sentence of three to seven years, but then-Judge Harry Lee Coe III sentenced Quevedo to seven years of probation in 1984.
Almost immediately, Quevedo violated his probation, leaving Tampa for California.
"He was given seven years' probation and has never even done a week of probation," Assistant State Attorney Leland Baldwin said.
Years passed, and last December the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office began actively looking to charge Quevedo with violating his probation. On the morning of April 15, deputies made contact with Quevedo's father, who told them that he had not seen his son for two months. Nonetheless, Quevedo turned himself in several hours later.
Just two days later, Tampa police sent more detailed autopsy photos to Mrs. Hawkins' home in the Dallas suburb of Gun Barrel City. She identified the woman as her sister on her own daughter's 17th birthday, and since then her family has not been the same. The parents have trouble sleeping and fear for their teenage daughters' lives if the girls are even a few minutes late.
"My kids have a very limited life now because of people like you," Jeff Hawkins told Quevedo.
"I hope the court system does the right thing this time," Hawkins said outside the courthouse. "They plea-bargained from second-degree murder down to manslaughter, and he never did any of it. I just hope they put him away for the maximum amount of time."
Then the Hawkins family made two more stops before getting ready to fly back to Texas. The first was to the parking lot median where Newton's body was found 16 years ago. There, they spent a few quiet minutes with the bouquet of lilies, mums and carnations and the cross they had placed there the night before.
Then they drove east, to the Rest Haven Memorial Park cemetery on Hanna Avenue. Just before rain started to fall in a slanting torrent, they saw the brand-new headstone that cemetery workers had put in place earlier in the day. It was at the end of Row 44, on what had been an unmarked grave for 16 years. It said:
Vickey Renee Newton
May 1, 1964 -- July 10, 1983
World's Greatest Sister
— Family finally faces girl's killer at hearing
After finding her missing sister on the Internet, a woman confronts the man convicted of killing the girl.
By RICHARD DANIELSON
© St. Petersburg Times, published June 5, 1999
TAMPA -- It took more than 15 years to identify the Jane Doe whose nude body was found near Floriland Mall in 1983 as Vickey Renee Newton of Texas. On Friday, Newton's family came to Tampa to give her a voice as well as a name.
In a Hillsborough County courtroom, Sharron Hawkins faced Vincent R. Quevedo, who has confessed to smothering Newton, and held up three sheets of paper. One was the missing person's sketch of Newton that Mrs. Hawkins found on the Internet this year. The next was the autopsy photo she used to identify her sister. The last was a portrait of a smiling, blond 15-year-old Vickey Newton.
"This is how I found my sister," Mrs. Hawkins said as she held up the missing person's sketch. "This is what you did to her, and this is what she was before you had her."
Her husband, Jeff Hawkins, said he fears for the safety of his teenage daughters because of people like Quevedo. "There's no remorse . . . in your face at all. None," Hawkins said. "You killed somebody and got away with it."
Almost.
Quevedo, 34, faces up to 15 years in prison for violating his probation on a 1984 manslaughter conviction in Newton's death. In a high, thin voice, Quevedo admitted Friday that he skipped out on his seven years of probation, but his attorney asked Circuit Judge Cynthia Holloway for another hearing at which he can present evidence supporting a less severe sentence. Holloway scheduled that hearing for June 30.
The June 30 hearing could end years of uncertainty that began the day in 1982 that Newton called her grandmother and said she was leaving the Dallas area with two bikers who were headed to Arkansas and then to Florida.
"She was always a sweet little girl, and she was very naive," Mrs. Hawkins said outside the courtroom Friday.
Newton, then just 17, had been married briefly, but had never given her family any sign that she wanted to leave Texas. Her call to her grandmother was the last that the family knew of her -- until this year.
In January, Mrs. Hawkins was looking at photos on the Web site for the Missing Children Help Center, when she saw a Tampa Police Department drawing of a Jane Doe found in Floriland Mall's parking lot in July 1983. The bulletin said the young woman's body had burn scars on the hands and thighs, matching Newton's injuries from a childhood accident.
Quevedo was charged with killing the unidentified woman in 1983 and had confessed to suffocating her to keep her quiet as the two had sex in his car, then dumping her body, taking money from her purse and throwing the handbag in the Hillsborough River.
Police said at the time that Quevedo was charged with second-degree murder because there was no evidence of premeditation. They described the then-unknown woman as a "short-time acquaintance" of Quevedo.
With little physical evidence and few witnesses, he managed to plead guilty to a reduced charge of manslaughter. State sentencing guidelines called for a prison sentence of three to seven years, but then-Judge Harry Lee Coe III sentenced Quevedo to seven years of probation in 1984.
Almost immediately, Quevedo violated his probation, leaving Tampa for California.
"He was given seven years' probation and has never even done a week of probation," Assistant State Attorney Leland Baldwin said.
Years passed, and last December the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office began actively looking to charge Quevedo with violating his probation. On the morning of April 15, deputies made contact with Quevedo's father, who told them that he had not seen his son for two months. Nonetheless, Quevedo turned himself in several hours later.
Just two days later, Tampa police sent more detailed autopsy photos to Mrs. Hawkins' home in the Dallas suburb of Gun Barrel City. She identified the woman as her sister on her own daughter's 17th birthday, and since then her family has not been the same. The parents have trouble sleeping and fear for their teenage daughters' lives if the girls are even a few minutes late.
"My kids have a very limited life now because of people like you," Jeff Hawkins told Quevedo.
"I hope the court system does the right thing this time," Hawkins said outside the courthouse. "They plea-bargained from second-degree murder down to manslaughter, and he never did any of it. I just hope they put him away for the maximum amount of time."
Then the Hawkins family made two more stops before getting ready to fly back to Texas. The first was to the parking lot median where Newton's body was found 16 years ago. There, they spent a few quiet minutes with the bouquet of lilies, mums and carnations and the cross they had placed there the night before.
Then they drove east, to the Rest Haven Memorial Park cemetery on Hanna Avenue. Just before rain started to fall in a slanting torrent, they saw the brand-new headstone that cemetery workers had put in place earlier in the day. It was at the end of Row 44, on what had been an unmarked grave for 16 years. It said:
Vickey Renee Newton
May 1, 1964 -- July 10, 1983
World's Greatest Sister
