Anchors Away

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Speaker 2 All of our family memories are pretty much on the water.

Speaker 3 How's it going, Ryan? You got any fun?

Speaker 2 Yeah, great time.

Speaker 2 The happier times were definitely when a boat was involved.

Speaker 3 This is Captain Tom Hawks.

Speaker 4 Tom Hawks was a good guy. He surfed, he scuba-tove,

Speaker 4 he was kind of a a guy's guy.

Speaker 2 My father would introduce my brother and I, it would be, this isn't my son, this is my pride and joy.

Speaker 6 He always had that great laugh.

Speaker 6 He loved to joke around.

Speaker 3 It took him like 45 minutes to join us.

Speaker 6 He's 57 years old, but he was still, he was still like 12 at heart.

Speaker 9 I'm gonna go play some Marvin.

Speaker 10 Jackie, hello.

Speaker 7 Hi, honey. I'm so glad to be cool.

Speaker 2 I couldn't pitch with my father anyone else or Jackie with anyone else.

Speaker 3 Jackie's coming today. Got the boat all cleaned up.

Speaker 4 They were good, loyal friends, and they loved each other. You could look up Love in the Dictionary and you'd see these two people there.

Speaker 4 Tom Hawks, his dream was always to sail off into the sunset. And he bought this boat.
It's the well-deserved.

Speaker 4 It was well-deserved. They worked very hard for that.

Speaker 7 This is the beach that we collect our pukah shells on.

Speaker 4 Tom and Jackie had so much fun on the boat, I'm jealous of what they were able to do with that thing.

Speaker 4 They got to swim with dolphins and whales.

Speaker 9 Almost gotcha.

Speaker 4 Pull into Port Sakaul, go to little bars where mariachi bands are playing. They truly had the dream life.

Speaker 7 Massive search is underway for an Arizona couple last seen here in Newport Beach.

Speaker 4 It started out as a missing persons case. This needed to be solved.

Speaker 2 My father's friend called me and he's like, your dad's phone went to voicemail. It's really strange.
My dad's the kind of guy you can set a watch by.

Speaker 2 I called my brother and I'm like, what do you think is going on, man?

Speaker 6 I was trying to think of what had happened and my mind bounced back to the Skylar guy.

Speaker 4 Calling Skylar DeLeon a sociopath is probably an insult to sociopaths.

Speaker 9 We wanted that all-American little thing, you know.

Speaker 12 a house and all that kind of stuff.

Speaker 4 Jennifer DeLeone is manipulative. She's bossy.
The two of them meeting were like fire meeting gasoline.

Speaker 12 It's almost hard to tell the truth sometimes.

Speaker 4 After I look back and what he was able to do, he scares the hell out of me.

Speaker 6 I still wake up, I have nightmares.

Speaker 2 And you didn't think anything like this could ever happen to him.

Speaker 4 You can't make a Hollywood movie this horrific.

Speaker 15 Dark Voyage, tonight's 48 Hours Mystery.

Speaker 7 It sits cold as a tombstone,

Speaker 7 like bleached bones giving silent testimony to a crime that defies humanity.

Speaker 4 This is probably the 30th time I've been on the vessel and I don't like it.

Speaker 7 Newport Beach Detective Dave Byington doesn't rattle easily.

Speaker 4 I get the heebie cheebis on this boat.

Speaker 16 I just don't feel comfortable on it.

Speaker 4 You start to think about imagine, only try to imagine what they experience, and it's too horrific. It is.

Speaker 4 The boat's underway. It's nighttime.
It's cold. They don't know what's happening.
happening.

Speaker 7 The only thing that outweighs the horror of what happened that night is the power of Tom and Jackie Hawk's love.

Speaker 7 It is a fairy tale romance that started hundreds of miles away from any ocean in the mountains of Prescott, Arizona,

Speaker 7 where Tom was raising two sons alone.

Speaker 2 He was a man's man. He was, you know, very masculine, very outdoors.

Speaker 7 Tom's boys, Ryan and Matt.

Speaker 6 Big on his chores. We did a lot of chores, and he just wanted us to appreciate what we had in life.

Speaker 7 Sons from a first marriage that ended in an amicable divorce.

Speaker 2 He would take us to Catalina Island,

Speaker 10 do a lot of hiking.

Speaker 2 Some of my better times with him were on the water.

Speaker 7 Was it a good life?

Speaker 8 Oh, it's an absolute great life.

Speaker 7 It was a life where toughness was taught early on.

Speaker 2 You know, stay strong. I remember if I wrecked or cried as a little kid, he'd be like, toughen up, boy, toughen up, come on, come on.

Speaker 7 Above all else, this man played by the rules.

Speaker 16 I think Tom really enjoyed working with with people.

Speaker 7 Tom worked with the probation office of Yavapai County, helping those in trouble find a second chance.

Speaker 10 Tom was the kind of probation officer to take a real interest in the problems that his probationers were having.

Speaker 7 John Ryder, Brian Gray, and Bill Paiano were Tom's co-workers and knew what kind of a man he was.

Speaker 16 Tom was a quality guy.

Speaker 18 I believe Tom's family life, like most of us, was real important to him.

Speaker 7 But something major was missing. Then the tough single father had his heart melted by one Jackie O'Neill.

Speaker 7 She met Tom at a chili cook-off,

Speaker 7 I believe it was in July of 86. Patricia Schutz and Jackie O'Neill were best friends.

Speaker 7 He would walk on water for her. And she would do the same for him.
It was clear where things were heading. He got like down on his hands and knees and he asked her to marry him.

Speaker 7 She was very excited and she was very happy. And soon so were Ryan and Matt because there was a downside to life alone with father.

Speaker 2 And I remember he calls it his famous gulag and he would make a pot of it for like a week.

Speaker 2 And every time we'd come home for dinner, he'd be like, ugh, really this again?

Speaker 7 Thankfully, things changed once Tom and Jackie wed.

Speaker 6 Oh, dinners got a lot better.

Speaker 7 Both Matt and Ryan were still in elementary school. Did you think of Jackie as your mom also?

Speaker 6 Oh, absolutely. We called her mom growing up.

Speaker 7 She was the best mother any boys could ever have.

Speaker 2 Jackie, she's a real trooper.

Speaker 2 Most of the time when they do something, it's my father's idea and Jackie never complains and she just goes with it.

Speaker 7 So it came as no surprise when Tom sold their house and Jackie said yes to a dream her husband had been nurturing for years.

Speaker 16 Tom's goals in life was to retire and live on the sea and own a yacht.

Speaker 2 He said life's too short and it's my life and

Speaker 2 this is our time and I feel if I hesitate it'll just go by and I'll miss it.

Speaker 7 It was here in Newport Beach, California that Tom and Jackie Hawks came to find paradise. Their dream was rooted in two simple things, being together and being on a boat.

Speaker 7 Few people had lived better lives, so it seemed almost like fate when the couple bought a 55-foot yacht that was already named the Well-Deserved.

Speaker 3 This is Captain Tom Hawks and Well-Deserved.

Speaker 7 For Tom and Jackie, a dream had come true.

Speaker 7 Life was an endless cruise.

Speaker 3 We're heading out for these islands over here.

Speaker 8 Hi.

Speaker 7 Filled with good times and best friends. Happy Thanksgiving, everybody.

Speaker 8 Happy Thanksgiving.

Speaker 7 Did you have a chance to spend time with him on the boat? Yes. It was the most awesome journey in my life.

Speaker 7 Here was Tom trying to swim with us. From Catalina Island to Mexico's Sea of Cortez.

Speaker 3 This is what cruising is all about.

Speaker 18 Oh,

Speaker 18 yeah.

Speaker 2 I'd be sitting at work and I'd be getting emails like, the water's 80 degrees, the surf's pump in, and mom's making me go catch dinner. And I'm like, life's tough.

Speaker 3 And there's the sun going down.

Speaker 7 It's hard to explain what the feeling is out here.

Speaker 2 Being on water for them was a solitude. It was seeing the curve of the earth and seeing the sunset fall right behind it every night.

Speaker 7 While the Hawks were living life on the sea, something wonderful was happening in the mountains of Prescott, Arizona. Something that would alter their lives forever.

Speaker 7 Matt and his wife Nicole welcomed Baby Jace.

Speaker 6 Oh, they were just

Speaker 6 very excited.

Speaker 6 Jackie was already buying baby clothes.

Speaker 7 Oh, he is looking at you, grandpa.

Speaker 3 I've never seen such a big nose.

Speaker 7 After three years at sea, Tom and Jackie decided being grandparents was worth more than all the sunsets across the Pacific.

Speaker 6 They wanted to come back and be part of our lives because they believed very strongly in family.

Speaker 7 They put a small ad in a boating magazine. The well-deserved was on the market.
All they needed now was an honest buyer.

Speaker 12 Tom and Jackie Hawks put their boat up for sale and I went to buy it.

Speaker 7 Schuyler DeLeone.

Speaker 7 File under loser.

Speaker 12 Growing up, I've never really felt like loved.

Speaker 7 If the Hawks are all about family, Skylar, the man who answered the ad for the well-deserved, is all about the lack of it. Was it a happy childhood?

Speaker 12 No, my childhood.

Speaker 8 I hated it.

Speaker 12 I guess the environment, my dad.

Speaker 7 Tell me a little bit about your dad.

Speaker 8 I hated him.

Speaker 12 He was into manufacturing drugs and I guess distributing and selling them.

Speaker 7 Big-time drug dealer?

Speaker 12 I would say so.

Speaker 7 Despite those odds, Skylar did try to make something of himself as an actor.

Speaker 7 He even made it onto a TV show, The Power Rangers. He would tell people he was a major member of the show's cast.
And that was a lie.

Speaker 18 Yes.

Speaker 7 In fact, you were just an extra on the show?

Speaker 12 It was a guest something.

Speaker 7 How many times?

Speaker 12 Three times.

Speaker 7 Then, eager to get away from an abusive home, Schuyler joined the Marines.

Speaker 12 I ended up going to UA.

Speaker 7 Were you AWOL? Yes, I was.

Speaker 7 Schuyler was fast-drifting nowhere.

Speaker 12 I don't think I have a life plan.

Speaker 7 And then, Schuyler DeLeon met a small-town girl with big ideas.

Speaker 7 How did you guys meet?

Speaker 2 From a random email.

Speaker 7 Jennifer Henderson grew up in Long Beach, California in a devoutly religious home. She'd finished high school and ended up working in a hair salon.

Speaker 7 After they chatted for a few weeks online, she and Schuyler agreed to meet at the mall.

Speaker 4 She wasn't really doing a whole lot with her life until she met Schuyler.

Speaker 7 Orange County prosecutor Matt Murphy now knows everything about these two aimless young adults and their twisted relationship.

Speaker 4 He was basically a manipulator and somebody was a complete con man. And she was a spoiled brat, basically so the two of them getting together was the perfect combination.

Speaker 12 I think she's definitely more dominant.

Speaker 7 They'd marry and soon Haley was born. Pressure mounted for Schuyler to support his new family and prove his worth to Jennifer.

Speaker 19 I definitely loved her.

Speaker 12 I mean to the point there's

Speaker 12 I mean, nothing I wouldn't do for her.

Speaker 7 But Schuylkar couldn't hold a job, couldn't find a way to move his young family out of his in-law's garage apartment. He grew desperate.

Speaker 7 Other than going AWOL with the military, had you ever committed a crime before all of this started to happen?

Speaker 12 Not until I met Jen.

Speaker 7 Schuyler's new ambition led him to a new line of work, burglary.

Speaker 7 But he was arrested and ended up here, California's Seal Beach City jail, leaving Jennifer to care for their baby.

Speaker 4 There were $87,000 in debt. Schuyler had no job.
She was pregnant again.

Speaker 7 Was she happy?

Speaker 19 No.

Speaker 7 Tired of the bills. Tired of the bills.
Tired of living at the bills.

Speaker 2 Tired of living at the parents.

Speaker 12 She's like, you know, well, we got to do something.

Speaker 7 It was that pressure that led Skylar to Tom and Jackie Hawks.

Speaker 7 Where he used the one deadly skill he really had.

Speaker 7 How do you rate Schuyler as a con artist?

Speaker 4 As far as his effect on other people,

Speaker 4 I've never seen anything like Schuyler.

Speaker 7 This is all that is left of Tom and Jackie's dream. The well-deserved is now in dry dock in a Southern California lot.

Speaker 7 Even those who chase horror for a living are haunted by the depravity of what happened here.

Speaker 4 It drives me nuts. It gets me so angry.

Speaker 4 And you start thinking about it. It's one of those things you need to get out of your mind because it's that terrible.

Speaker 7 It all began with that simple ad in a boating magazine. The ad that Tom had placed so he and Jackie could spend more time with their family.

Speaker 19 I called and I talked to him.

Speaker 7 Were you planning on buying the boat?

Speaker 19 Well, we didn't really have the money.

Speaker 7 So then what was your thought?

Speaker 12 I guess our thought at that point was to, I guess,

Speaker 12 rip them off.

Speaker 7 But Schuyler knew he would need help. That's when he enlisted this man, Alonso Machain, a young prison guard he had met when locked up on that burglary charge.

Speaker 4 Alonso is unsophisticated. He hasn't been a lot of places.
He hasn't done a lot of things. So he was ripe, I think, for Schuyler to enlist as a Confederate in this whole thing.

Speaker 7 On November 6, 2004, Schuyler and Alonso went down to the waterfront to meet Tom and Jackie. Tom, smart and savvy, didn't like what he saw.

Speaker 4 Thomas Hawkes had been a probation officer for 20 years, and Thomas Hawkes was kind of leery.

Speaker 7 Tom Hawkes was asking $435,000 for the well-deserved. Schuyler just didn't look like the kind of guy with that kind of cash.
When Jackie started proudly boasting about her new grandchild,

Speaker 7 Schuyler saw his opening. Hi, Grandpa.
Family. Holding his old grandboy.

Speaker 4 The first thing Schuyler did when they got off the boat is he picked up his phone and he called Jennifer up in Long Beach.

Speaker 4 And he said, you got to come down here and bring Haley and put these people at ease.

Speaker 7 So Jennifer came down that same day.

Speaker 7 Use the kids. Right.

Speaker 4 I can't think of anything more horrific than a mother using her child.

Speaker 8 It's.

Speaker 8 I don't know.

Speaker 7 But the Hawks fell for it, convinced they had a real buyer. They couldn't imagine the trap that was being set.

Speaker 7 No one could.

Speaker 7 The disgraced Marine sized up the lifelong public servant. Physically?

Speaker 17 Physically.

Speaker 7 Mentally? Yes. To see if you could overtake them? Yes.
And what did you think when you saw Tom?

Speaker 12 He's pretty big.

Speaker 7 The gang of two needed a tough guy.

Speaker 4 Schuyler had recruited a gang member from Long Beach named John Fitzgerald Kennedy. He's with a gang called Insane Crips.

Speaker 7 It gives a sick new meaning to ironic. Arrested more than 20 times, John Fitzgerald Kennedy joined the plot.

Speaker 7 Schuyler set a date to test drive the boat while Jennifer sat home, her child having served her purpose.

Speaker 4 She's up to her eyeballs in the whole thing.

Speaker 7 It was November 15th.

Speaker 7 Alonzo came along, and JFK even wore a suit.

Speaker 7 Schuyler told Tom and Jackie Kennedy was his accountant.

Speaker 7 The well-deserved headed out to sea.

Speaker 7 You were able to fool him?

Speaker 7 I think so. You're that good of a liar?

Speaker 12 I hate to say, yeah, but I think so.

Speaker 7 Good and evil were about to intersect in the waters off Newport Beach.

Speaker 7 Tom and Jackie Hawks guided the well-deserved from the shelter of the harbor.

Speaker 7 But as light danced across the waves, darkness was set to descend, brought on by the very passengers they had invited on board. Alonso McChain, John Kennedy, and their hapless leader, Schuyler DeLeon.

Speaker 12 I don't think anything was even 100% serious until it was too late.

Speaker 7 And when was that?

Speaker 12 On the boat.

Speaker 7 That is one of Schuyler's lies.

Speaker 7 The truth is, everything was deadly serious and meticulously plotted weeks before, when Schuyler and Jennifer used their very own baby to con Tom Hawks into believing they were honest buyers.

Speaker 14 He's capable of making decisions, planning things out over a period of time.

Speaker 7 Detective Sergeant Dave Boyington and Sergeant Evan Saylor would come to know everything about Schuyler's plans, right down to the tasers and handcuffs he brought on board.

Speaker 7 It gives a whole new meaning to the concept of premeditated, does it not?

Speaker 4 Beyond anything I could imagine.

Speaker 7 That is because stealing the 55-foot yacht was only the start of the plan.

Speaker 4 They didn't want to get a job. They wanted to take other people's money.

Speaker 7 Because of the work led by Bonington and Saylor, the well-deserved would become evidence. Incredible detective work by the two cops would eventually reveal every horrifying moment of that day at sea.

Speaker 7 But this was really their home.

Speaker 4 Yes, it was. They lived here.
This is pretty much as if they left for a short trip and then came back. Everything is intact the way it was when they lived on it.

Speaker 4 This is the main stateroom where the bed is where Thomas and Jackie slept.

Speaker 7 The boat was now anchored well outside Newport Beach Harbor. Schuyler de Leon went below.

Speaker 7 Moments later, John Kennedy, the hulking gangbanger who was pretending to be Schuyler's accountant, also came down, feigning seasickness.

Speaker 4 Eventually, Thomas Hawkes goes down to investigate because they're not returning.

Speaker 7 Jackie remained on deck with the jittery Alonso Machain.

Speaker 4 Jackie first hears a commotion down in the stateroom and at this point she sees Thomas Hawkes being choked by John Fitzrell Kennedy and being struck by Schuyler DeLeon.

Speaker 7 And then what does Alonso do to her up here?

Speaker 4 Alonzo now knows that he has to do his part and he starts to overpower Jackie first by applying the taser. He actually overpowers this poor woman, puts handcuffs on her.

Speaker 4 Schuyler and John Fitzgerald Kennedy end up overpowering Thomas Hawkes, handcuff him, and eventually both, Jackie Hawks is brought downstairs with Thomas Hawks and they are laid on their bedroom.

Speaker 7 Bound, now Tom and Jackie Hawks would be gagged.

Speaker 4 Skylar tells Alanza to go get some duct tape and Skylar instructs him to duct tape over their mouth and their eyes and he proceeds to do so.

Speaker 7 Tom and Jackie huddled together on their bed. These are the details their sons Ryan and Matt would come to know.
Agonizing flashbacks that will never fade.

Speaker 2 She couldn't stop crying.

Speaker 2 She was yelling at Schuyler, saying,

Speaker 2 you this, you that, you took your baby daughter and your and your wife on your on our boat.

Speaker 6 How could you? She was begging for her life, wanting to see her grandchild again. I mean, she was only 47 years old.

Speaker 2 And I think the only thing my father could move was his hands, and he just calmly stroked Jackie's hands to give her some level of comfort.

Speaker 7 That's the last moment they, that's the last gentle moment they had between the the two of them.

Speaker 4 And I never thought of that. You're absolutely right.
That is. And everything else is just pure horror.

Speaker 7 Finally, the depth of the depravity of Schuyler's plan was about to be revealed. He produced this set of phony documents and handed the Hawks a pen.

Speaker 7 What was the paperwork that you wanted them to sign?

Speaker 12 It was the documentation of the vessel and

Speaker 19 the power of attorney.

Speaker 7 For all of their bank accounts?

Speaker 5 Yes.

Speaker 7 It's all laid out here.

Speaker 4 Papers are laid out. They brought with them an ink pad.
Jackie's obviously still crying. She can't help herself, and it's understandable.

Speaker 4 They remove one handcuff, and they remove a little bit of the tape so that she can see out, instruct her to sign her name, roll her fingerprints.

Speaker 4 Then Schuyler starts asking her various questions about her accounts, account numbers, where the banks are.

Speaker 7 Now it was Tom's turn to sign away the honest life he had worked so so hard for to a man who had hardly worked an honest day in his life.

Speaker 6 If there was a chance of living,

Speaker 6 I think he was willing to just stay calm and follow their commands.

Speaker 4 And he proceeds to sign all the paperwork, roll his fingerprints, and gives him the account information that he's requesting.

Speaker 7 The phony paper signed, the well-deserved powered further out to sea.

Speaker 4 Scotto came up and punched in coordinates, which sent him out to Santa Catalina.

Speaker 7 And he knew exactly where he was going. Absolutely.
Out towards the deep waters off Catalina Island, where Tom and Jackie had so many good times. Hi, Jackie.

Speaker 7 And where only days before they had enjoyed a final cruise with friends on the well-deserved.

Speaker 4 And these people were living a dream, and Scotland just took it.

Speaker 7 Handcuffed, gagged, and now tied to one another with nautical ropes, Tom and Jackie were dragged up on deck.

Speaker 7 That is when they heard the sound.

Speaker 4 He hears that chain coming, there's no doubt. Because when Skylar gets behind him and starts to, he actually hooks the anchor to the rope.
So now this anchor is now attached to these two poor people.

Speaker 7 This big heavy anchor.

Speaker 4 It's massive.

Speaker 7 But was the anchor used?

Speaker 18 Yeah.

Speaker 7 It was used.

Speaker 2 He heard that sound a hundred times and he's like, son of a bitch, they're not going to let us go.

Speaker 6 He knew his destiny, and I believe that's why he fought back one last time.

Speaker 4 And he basically does a reverse mule kick with his leg and kicks Skylar. He kicks him so severely that Skylar is lifted up off of his feet and lands on his backside.

Speaker 4 John Fitzgerald Kennedy is where you're at. He sees this and JFK is a big man and he levels him, hits him.
It knocks Thomas Hawkes out because the punch is so severe and so violent.

Speaker 7 With the anchored chain tied around the couple, Schuyler threw the anchor overboard. The chain fed out into the sea, yanking Tom and Jackie into the icy waters.

Speaker 2 So that's where they are right now. They're 3,600 feet below the cold Pacific Ocean, tied to an anchor.

Speaker 7 Have you cried?

Speaker 6 Absolutely by myself.

Speaker 7 Just alone?

Speaker 6 Yes, but I don't cry in front of people.

Speaker 7 The deed now done, the well-deserved headed back to Newport Beach. Schuyler DeLeone called his wife Jennifer on his cell phone.
You called her after they were dead?

Speaker 6 Yes.

Speaker 7 Do you remember what she said?

Speaker 12 I remember her asking if I was sure.

Speaker 7 And what did you tell her?

Speaker 12 I was like, I'm sure.

Speaker 7 Schuyler had a motto. Can you tell me what that was?

Speaker 14 No body, no crime. No body, no crime.

Speaker 7 And he thought he was going to get away with it because there were no bodies.

Speaker 14 Yes.

Speaker 20 Hey there, we're Corinne Vienne and Sabrina D'Anaroga here to introduce our newest podcast, Crimes of, a Crime House Original.

Speaker 21 Crimes of is a weekly series that explores a new theme each season, from Crimes of the Paranormal, Unsolved Murders, and more.

Speaker 21 Our first season is Crimes of Infamy, the true crime stories behind Hollywood's most iconic horror villains.

Speaker 20 Listen to and follow Crimes of, available now wherever you get your podcasts.

Speaker 7 Friends and family believe Tom and Jackie had just sold the Well Deserve and were headed home to Prescott to see their new grandson. Matt and Ryan couldn't wait.

Speaker 2 I called my dad's first, went straight to voicemail. Then I called Jackie's, and it went straight to voicemail, and he never shit off their phone.

Speaker 7 What was going through your head at that point?

Speaker 2 I was thinking, I'm like, maybe they'd take a last-minute cruise. And I talked to my uncle Jim,

Speaker 2 which is, he's a retired chief of police for Carls Ben.

Speaker 7 Jim Hawks is Tom's big brother. They had spoken just a few days earlier about Skylar and Jennifer buying the boat.

Speaker 11 It was very brief, you know, just, hey, ugly.

Speaker 11 We called each other that.

Speaker 11 And if you need help when you get ready to move, just let us know.

Speaker 7 But it had been about a week since that final conversation.

Speaker 7 Jim decided to take a look at his brother's boat, which was tied up back in Newport Beach.

Speaker 11 We circled the boat on its mooring and noticed things out of place.

Speaker 7 Then Jim and a friend boarded the well-deserved.

Speaker 11 I said, just be careful, don't touch any, you know, smooth surface. Let's treat this like it could be a crime scene.

Speaker 2 And I called my brother and he finally said it out loud. I'm like, well, what do you think is going on, Matt? And he's like, they're dead.
I think they're dead.

Speaker 7 11 days after Tom and Jackie last left port, Jim Hawks filed a missing persons report.

Speaker 7 That's when Bynton and Saylor drew the case of a lifetime. At what point then did you first hear the names Schuyler and Jennifer DeLeon?

Speaker 4 Actually, the De Leones were both listed in the initial missing person report.

Speaker 7 Within days, Schuyler agreed to be interviewed.

Speaker 4 Were you looking to buy a boat?

Speaker 17 I'm pretty much always looking.

Speaker 17 Yesterday.

Speaker 7 Cool, calm, and collected.

Speaker 7 The con man spun his tail.

Speaker 17 This is exactly, you know, what I want.

Speaker 12 This is a perfect boat.

Speaker 7 Sure, Schuyler told the cops. He just bought the well-deserved.

Speaker 12 We spent like $4.85 on it.

Speaker 7 But he'd never taken it out of the harbor.

Speaker 7 Schuyler said he had paid Tom Hawks in cash and that Tom and Jackie had said something about heading down to Mexico.

Speaker 12 As far as we know, he's in San Carlos right now.

Speaker 7 When asked where he got over $400,000 in cash, Schuyler came up with a doozy, saying the cash was profit from a drug deal sixty thousand dollars here or ninety thousand dollars there right talking about this money that he had a launder he was very at ease telling us this stuff it threw detectives off skylar confessing to a crime plus he had all the paperwork to prove the boat was legally his all those documents he had forced tom and jackie to sign skylar you got nothing to do with his disappearance right no and your wife doesn't either no

Speaker 7 police also spoke to jennifer and for the most part the cops bought the couple's story thanks very much

Speaker 4 just like the hawks had i was convinced that they were telling the truth

Speaker 7 but their story began to fall apart when the daily owns went to tom and jackie's bank with that phony power of attorney document they tried to make a withdrawal

Speaker 4 We've got surveillance videos of her smiling ear to ear, you know, trying to basically steal these people's money.

Speaker 7 And then police got a tip from Schuyler's parole officer, learning he had asked permission to leave the country.

Speaker 14 Our concern was that he's now a flight risk.

Speaker 7 That's when Schuyler DeLeon was arrested, but not for murder.

Speaker 14 He just kept on asking me, what am I being charged with? Once I told him it was money laundering, I could see that kind of like that sigh of relief.

Speaker 7 That feeling wouldn't last long.

Speaker 7 As police moved in, searching the cramped garage apartment Schuyler and Jennifer had so desperately wanted to leave behind.

Speaker 14 And we found their video camera.

Speaker 7 The Hawks' video camera. Yes.

Speaker 14 We found Jackie's laptop computer and then the batteries to Thomas and Jackie's Sprint Nextel phones.

Speaker 14 On December 16th, we get a call from San Miguel Village, Mexico, saying that the Hawks vehicle is there.

Speaker 4 And then we come to find out the vehicle had been dropped off by Schuyler about a week earlier, following him in another car with his wife Jennifer.

Speaker 7 It was time to talk with the district attorney.

Speaker 4 We hit it out of the ballpark getting Matt Murphy as our DA.

Speaker 7 Matt Murphy, with his love of surfing

Speaker 7 and his passion for justice, quickly grasped the enormity of what had happened.

Speaker 4 Thomas and Jackie Hawks were not only really good people, they were totally innocent.

Speaker 7 Prosecutor Matt Murphy had a problem. He had never dealt with a crime scene like this before, and he knew very little about boats, but he knew someone who did.

Speaker 9 I'm not a nine-to-five guy.

Speaker 7 Salty Sam, aka Gary Burns, a friend of Murphy's, 6,000 miles away in Darwin, Australia.

Speaker 9 He's a character.

Speaker 4 He's lived on boats for pretty much his whole life.

Speaker 7 Matt called Gary and described the shadowy outlines of the case.

Speaker 9 I called Matt back and said in a boat that size will probably have, for sure, two anchors.

Speaker 9 Get your guys to go on board the boat, count the anchors that are on there.

Speaker 4 Sure enough, just like Gary said, there was an anchor that should have been on the boat that wasn't.

Speaker 7 Now, investigators had their theory. What they needed was an eyewitness, and Schuyler provided one.

Speaker 17 His name is Alonso Machain.

Speaker 7 Alonso Machain. Schuyler told police Alonso had been with him when he bought the boat and could back up his story.

Speaker 7 But Schuyler bet wrong on Alonso.

Speaker 14 He is the only one in this investigation that actually had a conscience, and it was that guilty conscience eating at him.

Speaker 7 After briefly fleeing to Mexico, Alonso returned to Newport Beach and made a full confession about his involvement.

Speaker 23 I was able to cuff Mrs. Hawk because she seemed to know what's going on.

Speaker 7 And every horrific detail of the murders.

Speaker 23 Schuyler was looking for an

Speaker 23 to push them over.

Speaker 23 Oh, Skylar acted as well they were being battled and tossed overboard. It was called

Speaker 23 like the most normal thing.

Speaker 7 Machane also told police about the muscle for the murder.

Speaker 7 Gang member John Fitzgerald Kennedy.

Speaker 7 March 2005, Alonso,

Speaker 7 JFK,

Speaker 7 and mastermind Skylar DeLeone are all charged with the murders of Tom and Jackie Hawks.

Speaker 7 Jennifer DeLeone told a local news crew Schuyler was innocent. Would your husband want to kill someone for their money? No.

Speaker 7 Not him.

Speaker 7 But Murphy and company weren't done yet. They had the alleged killers who had been on the boat.

Speaker 7 Now it was time to focus on the one who dialed into the murder on a cell phone.

Speaker 4 They tie him up, he called Jennifer.

Speaker 4 From the time they were killed, he made a call to Jennifer. When they were returning back after throwing these poor people off a boat, he made a call to Jennifer.

Speaker 7 What if they try and point the finger at you and say you were involved?

Speaker 24 You have to be positive and hope that they wouldn't come to that and wouldn't take you away from your kids.

Speaker 7 23-year-old Jennifer DeLeon is now facing the same fate as her husband.

Speaker 7 A month after her husband, Jennifer DeLeone, was also charged with first-degree murder.

Speaker 4 Thomas and Jackie Hawks were thrown overboard alive and begging for their lives.

Speaker 7 Matt Murphy was determined to get justice for Tom and Jackie Hawkes.

Speaker 4 It is as ruthless and as dark and as cold-blooded as any murder capable of being committed by another human being.

Speaker 4 This very well thought out, diabolical plot to do this,

Speaker 4 they thought they were going to get away with it because the bodies have never and will never be recovered.

Speaker 4 The three defendants were charged with two counts of murder each.

Speaker 7 Prosecutor Matt Murphy was working overtime preparing to bring Skylar DeLeon and his crew to justice. 23-year-old Jennifer DeLeon is now potentially facing the same fate as her husband.

Speaker 7 With Schuyler his prime target, Murphy approached his wife Jennifer with a deal.

Speaker 4 We offered her immunity.

Speaker 7 You basically gave her a full ride out of any trouble.

Speaker 4 We offered her a complete walk initially in the investigation.

Speaker 7 And she said no?

Speaker 4 And she said no.

Speaker 7 Jennifer refused to testify against her husband, but Schuyler was willing to tell us about Jennifer. Whose idea was it to kill them? Yours or hers?

Speaker 12 She threw it out there of what if they're not here.

Speaker 7 And you agreed?

Speaker 12 And I agreed.

Speaker 7 A young mother could spend the rest of her life in prison. First to stand trial, Jennifer DeLeon.
In less than four hours. And on November 17th, 2006,

Speaker 7 Jennifer is found guilty of first-degree murder and is sentenced to two life terms in a California prison.

Speaker 7 Schuyler would be tried next.

Speaker 7 What are your thoughts on him testifying?

Speaker 4 Not a chance.

Speaker 7 That from Schuyler's own attorney, Gary Poulson. And why is that?

Speaker 13 Because he's told so many lies.

Speaker 7 And it turns out Tom and Jackie may not be Schuyler's only victims. Who's J.P.
Jarvey?

Speaker 14 John Jarvey.

Speaker 7 And who is he?

Speaker 12 He was the person that I was at Seal Beach Jail with.

Speaker 7 Did you you kill him?

Speaker 5 That's

Speaker 7 Gary Poulson wouldn't let Schuyler tell us about this man, John Jarvie. Schuyler targeted Jarvey a year before he met Tom and Jackie.

Speaker 4 He conned John Jarvie into taking out $50,000 on his condo.

Speaker 4 Told some sort of story that John Jarvey bought into and convinced John Jarvie to accompany him down into Mexico. And he led him off down into a ravine, and there Schuyler DeLeon cut his throat.

Speaker 7 Schuyler is charged with John Jarvey's murder, leaving no question that the con man is also a cold-blooded killer. Did you kill Tom and Jackie Hawks?

Speaker 12 Per, I guess, according to law and stuff like that, yes.

Speaker 7 The answer is yes? Yes.

Speaker 7 The three killings are are merged into one trial.

Speaker 9 I expect a pretty quick verdict.

Speaker 7 And it didn't take long.

Speaker 25 And it's guilty, guilty, guilty.

Speaker 7 Schuyler is convicted of the murders of Tom and Jackie Hawks and John Jarvey.

Speaker 7 Other than his father. Now, Gary Poulson was only fighting for one thing.

Speaker 7 Keeping Schuyler off death row.

Speaker 8 That's all I'm going for.

Speaker 7 But those who treasure the memory of Tom and Jackie had very different ideas.

Speaker 7 Death.

Speaker 2 I'm hoping for the death penalty.

Speaker 16 If anybody deserves a death penalty, it's Schuyler DeLeon.

Speaker 7 Are you afraid to die?

Speaker 5 No.

Speaker 7 Schuyler's life hung in the balance, yet he was still blaming everyone but himself.

Speaker 7 The feeling I'm getting from you is that You're this weasly little guy who's trying to make his wife happy. You concoct this big scheme, and then you lost control of it.

Speaker 7 Yeah.

Speaker 7 Kind of.

Speaker 7 That's the part that people will hold you responsible for.

Speaker 7 And the people did.

Speaker 7 On April 10th, 2009, Schuyler DeLeon is sentenced to death.

Speaker 2 It wasn't a good feeling or exciting.

Speaker 2 It was sad because it was all over. My parents are still missing.
And I'll never get a chance to bury them. I'll never get a chance to say goodbye.

Speaker 2 And

Speaker 15 that bothers me.

Speaker 7 In death, as in life, Tom and Jackie Hawks touched everyone they ever met.

Speaker 4 Ever since this thing started, every day I look at the ocean and I say hi to Tom and Jackie. Every day, I make a point of saying hello to them both.

Speaker 7 Do you think you always will?

Speaker 8 Probably, yeah.

Speaker 25 In 2009, gang member John Fitzgerald Kennedy was found guilty and sentenced to death. California's governor imposed a moratorium on executions in 2019.

Speaker 25 Alonso Machain was found guilty and sentenced to 20 years for crimes including manslaughter and kidnapping.

Speaker 26 You think you understand how this business works, but you don't.

Speaker 27 Landman, TV's biggest phenomenon, returns to Paramount Plus. From Taylor Sheridan, co-creator of Yellowstone, starring Billy Bob Thornton.

Speaker 27 You have to know the rules of the game and bend them, and you really have to know them to break them. Demi Moore.

Speaker 7 I want success.

Speaker 22 Get it for me.

Speaker 27 Andy Garcia, Ali Larter, and Sam Elliott.

Speaker 26 You don't even know the game you're playing, do you?

Speaker 27 Landman, new season, now streaming. Only on Paramount Plus.

Speaker 22 Now streaming on Paramount Plus.

Speaker 26 Dearest Eva, I think about you all the time. Once I find you and your daughter, then I will kill you both.

Speaker 7 Those words and those threats were absolute psychological terrorism.

Speaker 22 Surviving 12 years of terror. You be prepared for my arrival.

Speaker 19 Oh my God.

Speaker 7 He found our house and he was coming.

Speaker 22 My nightmare stalker, the Eva LaRue story, now streaming on Paramount Plus.