A Central Florida jury decided a death penalty case with a dead body discovered in a trunk.
State Attorney Bill Gladson of the Fifth Judicial Circuit State Attorney’s Office reported that jurors recommended the death penalty in the murder conviction of DeMorris Andy Hunter, 59.
Prosecutors Richard Buxman and Kenneth Nunnelley presented the evidence against DeMorris Hunter for the 2002 murder of 38-year-old Theresa Ann Green before Orange County Judge Lisa T. Munyon, resulting in a guilty verdict.
“The victim’s family and friends have had a difficult time over the last two weeks,” said Bill Gladson, the State Attorney for the Fifth Judicial Circuit. “Revisiting the events of the night Green’s life was taken has been an incredibly painful experience.” I believe this is why the jurors recommended the most fitting sentence for the defendant: the death penalty.”
Hunter and the victim attended a couple’s party at their apartment building on May 26, 2002. They exited the party together, and witnesses observed them fall down the stairs before entering the victim’s apartment. Hunter went to her apartment hours later and requested a favor from a neighbor. He gave the neighbor the keys to a white van and asked him to follow him as he drove the victim’s car and dropped it off in a parking lot.
Officers from the Orlando Police Department received a missing person report for Green. Shortly after, Sanford Police Department officers found the victim’s car inside a Walgreens and discovered her dead body inside the trunk. The medical examiner’s Office ruled the victim’s death a homicide by hand strangulation.
During the inquiry, law enforcement confirmed that the victim was last seen alive with the suspect. When they spoke with the defendant, he was serving a 110-year term for another murder in Oakland, California.
“I was just 13 years old when I lost my mother’s presence, support, and invaluable love. While other children relied on their mothers for guidance, I was forced to navigate the most formative years of my life in her absence,” said the victim’s son, Octavius Hayes. “Every milestone since then has been bittersweet, marked by the hollowed out space where she should have stood…” I implore this court to acknowledge the inevitability of this loss and the exhaustion of a lifetime spent pursuing justice.”
The Orange County case was brought by Chief of Homicide Prosecution Richard Buxman and Assistant State Attorney Kenneth Nunnelley, who have worked relentlessly to seek justice for the victims and the state of Florida.
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