Jarmecca Yvonne "Nikki" Whitehead (April 18, 1975 – January 13, 2010) was a 34-year-old mother of 16-year-old identical twins Jasmiyah Kaneesha and Tasmiyah Janeesha Whitehead (born on November 27, 1993). On the afternoon of January 13, 2010, she was found dead in the bathroom of her Conyers, Georgia, home in the Bridle Ridge Walk subdivision. She had been beaten with a vase and stabbed repeatedly. Her daughters were arrested four months after the slaying on May 21, 2010, and charged with murder. Both initially pleaded not guilty. In a plea agreement, each twin pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of voluntary manslaughter in 2014. They were sentenced to serve 30 years in prison.
History
editIn 2000, 25-year-old Nikki met 55-year-old truck driver Robert Head. It was not long before she and the girls moved in with Head in the city of Conyers, Georgia.[1]
Tasmiyah and Jasmiyah were both honor roll students and Girl Scouts.[2] The girls were initially raised by their great-grandmother, Della Frazier. Frazier said that Whitehead was a sporadic and random presence in her children's lives. In 2007, when the twins were 13, Whitehead requested custody of them. Whitehead and the twins clashed. Frazier said that the twins saw their mother's attempts to control them as hypocritical. The conflicts escalated to physical altercations and resulted in counseling and juvenile court appearances. Frazier was given custody again, only to have Whitehead regain custody on January 5, 2010. The girls protested the decision, but the court ordered them and their mother to live together for a two-week trial period. Whitehead was killed on January 13, 2010.[3] The twins said that they discovered their mother dead. The medical examiner called the killing a crime of passion and not likely to have been performed by a stranger.[4] Whitehead's boyfriend was cleared after DNA testing. Evidence, including bite marks attributed to wounds inflicted by their mother during the fight, implicated the twins, and they were charged in May 2010.[5] Both initially pleaded not guilty.
Convictions
editIn January 2014, Tasmiyah pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter and other charges and was sentenced to 30 years in prison.[6] On February 7, 2014, one month after her twin, Jasmiyah pleaded guilty to the same charges and is serving the same sentence.[7] The twins are incarcerated at separate prisons within the Georgia Department of Corrections with Tasmiyah serving her sentence in Arrendale State Prison and Jasmiyah serving her sentence in Pulaski State Prison.[8] With over three years in jail before sentencing, the sisters were eligible for parole in 2017,[9][3] but as of October 2024, Tasmiyah had a Tentative Parole Month of March 2026, and Jasmiyah had a Tentative Parole Month of September 2027.[10]
See also
editReferences
edit- ^ Davis, Mark (June 13, 2010). "Mothers slaying haunts loved ones". Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Retrieved April 6, 2015.
- ^ Ma, Kai (August 26, 2011). "6. The Whitehead Sisters". Time. Retrieved April 6, 2015.
- ^ a b Queen, Alice (December 18, 2014). "Great-grandmother hopes twins who killed their mother will one day lead productive lives". The Rockdale Citizen. Retrieved June 12, 2023.
- ^ LaLama, Pat (27 October 2016). "Single mom killed by twin daughters in rage over strict home life". Crime Watch Daily. Telepictures Productions Inc. Retrieved 13 July 2018.
- ^ "Whitehead sister pleads guilty". The Covington News. January 9, 2014. Retrieved April 6, 2015.
- ^ Garner, Marcus (January 9, 2014). "Guilty plea from Rockdale twin accused in mother's death". The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Retrieved April 6, 2015.
- ^ "2nd Whitehead twin pleads guilty to manslaughter". The Covington News. February 7, 2014. Retrieved April 6, 2015.
- ^ "Twin sisters confess to brutal murder of mother". 11alive.com. WXIA-TV. Retrieved 12 June 2023.
- ^ Parole Handbook - A Guide to the Parole Consideration Process for People in Georgia Prisons (2nd ed.). Atlanta, Georgia: Southern Center for Human Rights. 2007. p. 6. Retrieved 12 June 2023.
- ^ "Inmate Tentative Parole Month (TPM) Look-up". papapps.pap.state.ga.us. State of Georgia. Retrieved 8 October 2024.