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Man draws sentence of life in prison for killing wife
By CHASE SQUIRES, Times Staff Writer DADE CITY -- Sometime over a 24-minute span -- from the time she was last seen alive until she was reported dead -- Jeremy Billy Vargas pounded his wife to death with a heavy, metal audiotape player. It took jurors two hours Wednesday to find him guilty of first-degree murder. And it took a judge less than three minutes to sentence him to life in prison without parole. Vargas, 25, bowed as the verdict was read. He put his head in his hands and shook it side to side. His late wife's sister, Kimberly Jackson, wept. "Justice was done," she said, tears rolling down her cheeks. In the second of two days of testimony, former Medical Examiner Marie Hansen provided a clinical account of the horrendous injuries Vargas inflicted on his wife, 23-year-old Theresa Vargas, on July 6, 1999. Hansen detailed 25 clusters of injuries covering Theresa Vargas' upper body, from her fingertips to her crushed skull: one eyeball slashed, two teeth knocked out, nose broken, deep cuts, abrasions, lesions, her spine crushed and her upper lip pulverized. "It looks sort of like ground hamburger," Hansen said of the lip. Jeremy Vargas denied the charges but did not take the stand in his defense. His appointed attorney, A.J. Ivie, contended in his closing remarks that there were no eyewitnesses to the crime. He said anyone could have attacked Theresa Vargas while his client was out of the filthy, abandoned house the two shared near Fifth Street and the U.S. 98 Bypass on Dade City's north side. The two used crack cocaine, and Theresa Vargas engaged in prostitution to raise money for her addiction, Ivie said. "What do we know about Theresa Vargas? I think we know she was a prostitute and a drug addict," Ivie said. "Those two things open the field to a number of people who could have killed her." Prosecutor Phil Van Allen, in his closing, said there was no doubt about the case. In the room where the body was found -- spattered ceiling to floor with blood -- there was but one set of footprints, and those prints matched Jeremy Vargas' bloodstained sandals, Van Allen said. He said Jeremy Vargas' stories that he discovered the body then became confused and ran around inside the house until he decided to go for help were "implausible, unbelievable explanations." In the end, jury forewoman Cynthia O'Neal said there was too much evidence to ignore. "It was a difficult case, just because of the serious charge," she said. "Just the brutality of it was difficult." Ivie said he would appeal. The Vargas couple had been seen arguing throughout the day of the murder, and later used crack cocaine, but just what motivated Jeremy Vargas to kill his wife? "I don't know," Van Allen said.
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From today's Pasco Times Letters |
