Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Waffle House killer again sentenced to death
Gerhard Hojan showed no mercy in 2002 to the teenage waitress who begged to live so she could see her infant son again. And he showed no mercy to the shortorder cook who decided he wasn’t going to lose his life without a fight.
On Tuesday, Broward Circuit Judge Paul Backman showed no mercy to Hojan, sentencing him to death by lethal injection for the murders of Christina Delarosa and Willy Absolu.
The victims were employees of the Waffle House in western Davie. Hojan and his original codefendant, Jimmy Mickel, had chosen to rob the restaurant early on March 11, 2002 — Mickel had once worked there, and Hojan was a regular.
That made the robbers recognizable, and led a third victim, Barbara Nunn, to believe she and her co-workers would be executed, according to trial testimony.
Nunn was shot but survived. In passing the sentence, Backman outlined the crime in detail, justifying his finding that prosecutors had proved beyond a reasonable doubt that Hojan deserved to die.
“They both were shot twice while kneeling on the floor of the freezer,” Backman recounted. “Delarosa was pleading for her life, hoping to be able to see her sixmonth-old son again. … She witnessed both of her co-workers being shot at close range. She at-
tempted to climb under the shelving of the freezer to shield herself, to no avail.”
Hojan was originally tried, convicted and sentenced to death in 2003. Mickel was acquitted of the murders but convicted of armed kidnapping — he is serving multiple life sentences for his role in the crime.
But recent changes in the state’s death penalty law gave Hojan a chance to win a life sentence — the original jury recommendation for death was by a 9-3 vote, and Florida law now requires a unanimous jury recommendation along with a finding that at least one aggravating factor had been proved beyond a reasonable doubt.
A new jury was empaneled in October solely to determine whether Hojan deserves a sentence of life or death.
By a unanimous vote, the jury chose death.
Hojan becomes the second Broward defendant to be sentenced to death under the new law. The first, Peter Avsenew, was sentenced in August following his conviction for the Christmas 2010 murders of Stephen Adams and Kevin Powell, a Wilton Manors couple.
Hojan is also the first inmate to be returned to death row after getting a second chance to plead for his life. Hearings are pending for 10 other former death row inmates from Broward who are entitled to new sentencing hearings under the changed law.
They include:
Howard Steven Ault,
the Fort Lauderdale man convicted of murdering DeAnn Emerald Mu'min, 11, and her sister, Alicia Sybilla Jones, 7, after luring them to his Fort Lauderdale home with the promise of Halloween candy.
Ronnie Keith Williams,
convicted of murdering Lisashantill Dyke, 18, who was baby-sitting for her boyfriend’s sister in Wilton Manors on Jan. 26, 1993.
James Herard, who goaded another man, Tharod Bell, to shoot and kill Eric Jean-Pierre, 39, a restaurant worker coming home to Lauderhill after day’s work. Pierre was chosen at random as part of a “body count” competition. Bell pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 50 years in prison.