Eddie Lee Sexton: Abuse, Murders, Trials, and Death Row

Eddie Lee Sexton Sr. was an Ohio father of twelve who ruled his family through decades of physical and sexual abuse, fled to Florida to avoid Ohio prosecution, and was sentenced to death for ordering his son to strangle his son-in-law, Joel Good, at a Hillsborough County state park in 1993. He died of apparent natural causes on Florida’s death row on December 29, 2010, at age 68, his sentence never carried out.¹

Abuse Inside the Sexton Family

Sexton and his wife, Estella May Sexton, raised twelve children in Jackson Township, Stark County, Ohio. Authorities later described his hold on the household as “complete domination and control.”² Records from his murder trial documented that he beat his children with his fists, a belt, a baseball bat, and an electric cord, and that he sexually abused his son Willie beginning when the boy was nine.³ He fathered at least two children through an incestuous relationship with his daughter Estella Mae, known as Pixie.

By the early 1990s the Stark County Department of Human Services had opened a child protective investigation. In November 1992, Sexton held a six-hour standoff with Jackson Township police over a dispute with social workers and served six days in jail.² Shortly after his release, he loaded the family into a motor home and left Ohio before charges for sexual abuse of the children could be filed.

Life on the Run in Florida

The Sextons settled in Tampa-area state parks, living out of their motor home. The FBI opened its own investigation into the sexual abuse of the children and unlawful flight to avoid prosecution.⁴

During this period Sexton’s infant grandson, Skipper Lee Good, died. The baby was the son of Pixie Sexton and Joel Good. Court records established that Pixie smothered the child at Eddie Sexton’s direction after he had prevented the family from seeking medical care. Sexton then ordered his sons Willie and Joel Good to bury the body in the woods.³ Pixie Sexton was later sentenced to six years in prison for the infant’s death.²

The Murder of Joel Good

Joel Good, Pixie’s husband, knew Eddie Sexton had fathered children with his own daughter, and he knew the circumstances of his infant son’s death. Sexton became convinced Good was a “snitch” who would give up the family’s location, telling relatives Good “knew too much” and would return to Ohio only in a “body bag.”⁵

On November 17, 1993, at Little Manatee State Park in Hillsborough County, Sexton ordered 22-year-old Willie to kill Good. Willie, who had been assessed as functioning at the cognitive level of an eight-year-old, used a garrote his father had provided and trained him to use: a rope tightened with a stick.⁴ Sexton was at the scene. When Good’s body still showed signs of life, Sexton kicked him and ordered Willie to “finish him off.”³

The two buried the body in the woods. Sexton told Willie to cut off Good’s hands with a machete to defeat fingerprint identification, but Willie could not do it. The rest of the family was told Good had gone back to Ohio. The medical examiner ruled the cause of death asphyxiation by ligature strangulation.⁵

The Plot Against Raymond Hesser

Also at Little Manatee River State Park, the Sextons befriended Raymond P. Hesser, a 41-year-old handicapped man living in a 30-foot recreational vehicle. They gained his trust by helping with his vehicle and wheelchair lift.⁶ Sexton and Willie planned to abduct, rob, and murder Hesser so Eddie could take over his identity, wheelchair, identification, and camper and continue evading law enforcement.⁴

The plan was never executed. FBI agents traced a call Sexton made from a park pay phone and located the family. The Sextons were arrested in January 1994.⁶ Both Eddie and Willie were charged with conspiracy to commit first-degree murder, and Eddie was later sentenced to 30 years on that count.⁴

Willie Sexton’s Plea

Willie Sexton was initially charged with first-degree murder. In September 1994, Judge Bob Anderson Mitcham ruled him incompetent to stand trial after five experts found he was mildly mentally retarded, with an IQ below 70, and suffered from depression and post-traumatic stress disorder.⁷ Willie later pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and received 25 years in prison in exchange for testifying against his father.⁴

Two Trials and a Death Sentence

Eddie Sexton was first tried in Hillsborough County in 1994 before Judge Robert Mitcham. On October 6, 1994, a jury convicted him of first-degree murder and recommended death by a vote of 7 to 5. He was sentenced to death on November 2, 1994, and to 30 years on the Hesser conspiracy the same day.⁸

The Florida Supreme Court reversed the conviction on July 17, 1997, ruling that testimony about the family’s incest, physical and sexual abuse, Satanism, and training of children to kill government agents had been improperly admitted and likely inflamed the jury.⁹

The retrial, before Judge J. Rogers Padget, produced a second guilty verdict on September 3, 1998, and a death recommendation by a vote of 8 to 4. Sexton was again sentenced to death on November 18, 1998.⁸ The court found three aggravating circumstances: a prior violent felony conviction for robbery, that the murder was committed to avoid arrest, and that the killing was cold, calculated, and premeditated. It weighed evidence of brain dysfunction and diminished self-control as mitigation but concluded Sexton had been the “mastermind” and the “dominating force” who controlled Willie through years of cruel abuse, making him significantly more culpable than the son who did the strangling.³

Appeals

The Florida Supreme Court affirmed the second conviction and death sentence on October 12, 2000, rejecting Sexton’s arguments that evidence of Skipper Lee Good’s death had been wrongly admitted, that he should have received new counsel, that victim impact testimony was improperly allowed, and that the death penalty was disproportionate.⁸

Sexton then moved to vacate the conviction and sentence, arguing among other things that his trial lawyers had been ineffective. After an evidentiary hearing the trial court denied the motion, and on September 18, 2008, the Florida Supreme Court affirmed, finding defense counsel had made reasonable strategic decisions in the penalty phase.¹⁰ Sexton filed a federal habeas petition in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida in March 2009; the last recorded activity was a response brief filed in December 2009.⁸

Death on Death Row

Eddie Lee Sexton Sr. was found dead in his cell at Union Correctional Institution in Raiford, Florida, at 5:46 a.m. on December 29, 2010. He was 68. Investigators found no signs of foul play, and the medical examiner noted pre-existing heart disease. An autopsy was completed with a final ruling pending toxicology, but authorities said the death appeared natural.¹ His federal habeas petition was still listed as pending when he died.

Estella Sexton’s Convictions

Estella May Sexton was arrested with the rest of the family near Tampa in January 1994. She was convicted in April 1994 of gross sexual imposition and child endangering and sentenced to two years in prison.¹¹ In May 1995 a Stark County grand jury indicted her on 31 further sexual abuse charges, including allegations that she had raped a son and a daughter; seven counts carried potential life sentences. In 1996 she was convicted in Stark County Common Pleas Court of rape and multiple counts of complicity to rape involving the couple’s children. She was imprisoned at the Ohio Reformatory for Women in Marysville and died at age 70 at the Franklin Medical Center, with the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction stating the cause was natural.¹²

1
Canton Repository. Ex-Jackson Township Killer Eddie Lee Sexton Dies
2
Canton Repository. Convicted Killer Eddie Lee Sexton
3
Findlaw. Sexton v. State
4
Florida Legislature. Capital Cases – Eddie Sexton
5
Florida State University Law Library. Sexton v. State, Answer Brief
6
Tampa Bay Times. Sextons Face Another Charge
7
Tampa Bay Times. Sexton Son Ruled Incompetent for Murder Trial
8
Florida Legislature. Capital Cases – Eddie Sexton Inmate Detail
9
Orlando Sentinel. 2nd Jury Says That Sexton Should Get Death Penalty
10
Findlaw. Sexton v. State (2008)
11
Tampa Bay Times. Sexton’s Wife Faces New Charges
12
Canton Repository. Wife of Eddie Lee Sexton Sr.