A life can be “redeemed,” lawyers for convicted Miami killer tell jurors at new sentencing
Most jurors determined that a plan engineered by Tavares Calloway to rob some small-time weed dealers nearly three decades ago went horribly sideways. They agreed that five people — bound at the hands and ankles by duct tape, their eyes and mouths shuttered with the same material — were murdered with single gunshots to their heads by Calloway.
Calloway, 45, who was sentenced to death by that jury in 2009, has spent every day of the past 27 years behind bars. During opening statements of his court-ordered re-sentencing trial Monday, a new set of jurors heard polar opposite critiques of the man already convicted of five brutal murders.
To Miami-Dade state prosecutors, Calloway is a “cold” and “calculating” killer who snuffed out five men in the prime of their lives. Yet his defense attorneys see him as someone who has grown from a neglected, poverty-stricken childhood, into a learned adult prisoner who befriended a Catholic Priest, with the pair now spending days helping other prisoners cope with their issues.
“He shot all five in the head and grabbed what he could find,” Miami-Dade Assistant State Attorney Abbe Rifkin told jurors during opening arguments Monday morning. “A life sentence is not sufficient for what he did.”
Calloway’s defense attorney Carmen Vizcaino explained how her client’s story began almost two decades before the 1997 crime, when his “unbelievably abusive” father would beat Calloway’s mom, once almost drowning her in a bathtub before she fled to Miami with her two sons.
“We are asking you to believe that a human life can be redeemed,” she said.
This week — like about a dozen others awaiting new trials in Miami-Dade criminal court — Calloway has the chance for a reprieve. Sentenced to die in 2009 by a 7-5 majority of jurors, a 2017 state Supreme Court decision ordered new sentencing trials for death row inmates who were not convicted unanimously.
That ruling, though, was upended early last year when by Gov. Ron DeSantis and state legislators passed a bill requiring a super-majority, or an 8-4 vote, for a judge to sign off on a death sentence. DeSantis was openly furious over the unanimous rule after convicted Parkland high school shooter Nikolas Cruz only received a life sentence for murdering 17 people and severely injuring 17 others.
The numerous re-sentencing trials, in which jury selection alone can take more than a week, aren’t quite jamming up the courthouse.
But there are several cases either ongoing or set for trial. Earlier this month, after a months-long pre-trial hearing for the re-sentencing of notorious John Doe gang leader Corey Smith’s death sentence, two state prosecutors were ousted by a judge who disagreed with their tactics.
That trial is expected to begin some time this summer.
‘Dead men tell no tales’
According to investigators and prosecutors, on Jan. 21, 1997, Calloway and accomplice Antonio Clark decided to do a “lick,” or rip-off some small-time weed dealers in an apartment near Little Haiti. Before getting there, Rifkin explained to jurors, they went to the local flea market where they picked up gloves, hats and camoflouge outfits.
When they arrived at the apartment, Calloway pulled out a .45 caliber handgun and confronted one of the men outside in the parking lot. He walked with him up the apartment, where all five men were ordered to take off their pants and get on their knees. Not quite certain what to do, Rifkin explained how Calloway ordered Clark to find something to tie the men up with. When he couldn’t, Calloway sent him to the store for duct tape.
With Calloway pointing the gun at them, Clark tied up the hands and ankles of all five men, then wrapped duct tape around their eyes and covered their mouths. At one point he ran out of tape and had to go back to the store to get more. Not certain what to do, they were advised by a local drug dealer to kill two of the men. That didn’t sit well with Calloway, who decided it was best to kill all five men. So three hours after taking them hostage, Calloway executed the men one at a time, shooting each in the head.
“Calloway thought that was a bad idea because of retaliation,” Rifkin told jurors. “Dead men tell no tales.”
For a year, the trail was cold for investigators. Then detectives investigating another murder found Clark, who had left a fingerprint at the site where the five men were murdered. Clark implicated Calloway and his statement to police was read to the jurors 15 years ago. Clark outed Calloway and told police his accomplice destroyed the weapon.
A jury found Calloway guilty of five counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of Adolphus “Tank” Melvin, 27, Gary St. Charles, 22, Trenton Thomas, 26, Frederick McGuire, 31 and Melvin’s visiting nephew, Derwin Bernard Copeland, 28. He was also found guilty of aggravated kidnapping, armed burglary and robbery and sentenced to death.
The trial, scheduled to continue Tuesday, is expected to last about a week.
