Jurors spare life of man who strangled, stabbed, killed woman during jealous rage

Robert Holton II, convicted last week in the deadly strangling, stabbing, burning and drowning death of a woman who spurned his romantic advances, will spend the rest of his life in prison.

It only took 55 minutes for a group of Miami-Dade jurors tasked with determining Holton’s fate Wednesday, to recommend unanimously to a judge that he should be locked up for life instead of sentenced to death. After jurors cleared the courtroom, Miami-Dade Circuit Court Judge Marisa TInkler Mendez made the recommendation official and sentenced Holton to life in prison.

The courtroom, packed with Holton’s family and those of Kayla Gloster, the woman he murdered, and law enforcement, was mostly subdued when the verdict was read. Most people were at peace with the jury’s decision — even grateful that litigation that dragged on for a decade was finally over.

Holton, in a buttoned-down white shirt and striped tie, hands in his pockets and standing up, was mostly stoic as the decision was read by the court clerk. He shook his head slightly up and down before being bear-hugged by defense attorney Tony Moss. Miami-Dade Assistant State Attorney Lara Penn walked over to Gloster’s family, hugged one member, then thanked them for taking part in the lengthy trials.

“Today was a win-win. I really didn’t have a preference. The big victory was guilty,” Gloster’s mother Tangela Johnson said outside the courtroom, surrounded by family.

“The guilty plea is number one. That’s all we wanted from Day 1,” Gloster’s grandmother Caron Dickson said.

Holton convicted after a decade, two mistrials

Just last week, Holton, a day laborer and former football coach, was found guilty of the first-degree murder of Gloster after a month-long trial involving the same jurors. That decision, which is unlikely to be appealed, came after a pair of mistrials that began in 2015 when a detective accidentally informed jurors that Holton was the lead suspect in a separate crime.

The second mistrial was last summer, when jurors over two days sent Judge Tinkler Mendez several notes saying they were deadlocked. Early last week, a jury finally found Holton guilty, which led to Wednesday’s sentencing.

During the course of his trial, state prosecutor Penn and co-counsel Scott Warfman portrayed Holton, 42, as the spurned wannabe boyfriend of Gloster, a popular student he met and began dating while she was still a teen attending an all-girls high school in South Miami.

They successfully argued that Holton was outraged that she had another boyfriend and seemed to be just dragging Holton along, accepting money from him each month to help with bills.

Defense attorney’ Moss and Jimmy DellaFera argued their client, repeatedly spurned by Gloster, killed out of passion. At one point during the closing argument at sentencing, Moss compared Holton to the Shakespearean character Othello, a military commander who killed his wife in a fit of jealous rage.

Ghastly acts led to Gloster’s death

Kayla Gloster’s life ended in November 2013, when she was only 22 years old. That’s the day, according to prosecutors, that Holton drove to her Naranja apartment in south Miami-Dade, had sex with Gloster, then committed a series of brutal acts that ended her life.

They say Holton strangled her so mercilessly that blood vessels popped in her eyes. Then he set her mattress on fire, wrapped Gloster in a quilt and dragged her into the bathroom where he forced her head down the toilet and drowned her. The Miami-Dade Medical Examiner said Gloser had severe cuts on one hand, indicating she fought a knife attack in which she was cut five times on her head and neck.

Then he left, prosecutors said, went home and fed his dog.

Someone in the neighboring apartment claimed to have heard a commotion. Blood with Holton’s DNA was found on the bedroom door, the living room wall and in the kitchen. An expert testified earlier that the odds of someone matching the blood type found to be Holton’s inside the apartment was 2.7 quadrillion to 1.

Holton was taken into custody 11 months after the 2013 murder and charged with first-degree murder and first-degree arson.

“There are no winners in capital cases. This was a terrible tragedy,” said DellaFera. “Thankfully, and maybe one day, we’ll do away with the death penalty in its entirety.”