Shelby Nealy trial: Jury recommends death penalty in murders of his wife’s parents, brother
Jury deliberating in Shelby Nealy sentencing trial
Closing arguments were given in a Pinellas County courtroom on Friday in the sentencing trial of Shelby Nealy, who faces the death penalty for the murders of his wife's parents and brother, which took place nearly a year after Nealy killed his wife. Kylie Jones reports.
CLEARWATER, Fla. - A Pinellas County jury recommended that Shelby Nealy, the defendant who murdered his wife's parents and brother, be sentenced to death in an 11-1 vote.
This comes after closing arguments by both the state and defense in his sentencing trial on Friday. The jury deliberated for about two hours before handing down the sentence.
The backstory:
Nealy is already serving a 30-year prison sentence after pleading guilty to manslaughter for killing his wife, Jamie Ivancic, 21, in Pasco County in January 2018.
Pictured: Jamie Ivancic.
He then pretended to be Jamie in the months that followed, corresponding with her family through texts and social media messages before they became suspicious.
In December 2018, he went to Jamie's parents' home in Tarpon Springs and killed her parents, Richard and Laura Ivancic, along with Jamie's brother, Nick.
Their bodies were found about two weeks later, and investigators arrested Nealy in Ohio in January 2019.
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In late 2023, Nealy pleaded guilty in Pinellas County to three counts of first-degree murder, along with three counts of aggravated animal cruelty for killing the family's dogs.
Dig deeper:
The state gave a lengthy closing argument Friday morning. For more than three hours, state prosecutor Bryan Sarabia laid out the timeline of Jamie's death and the murders of her parents, Richard and Laura Ivancic, and her brother, Nick Ivancic.
"His plan all along was to kill all three of these people to hide the fact and avoid the arrest for Jamie," Sarabia said.
Prosecutors emphasized the planning that went into the crime. They showed the jury a photo that Nealy took of his children at the Ivancic's home about a week before Richard, Laura and Nick were killed.
Pictured: Shelby Nealy in court during his sentencing trial.
"He sat with those people for a week," Sarabia said. "He drove from Texas to do this. That's cold, that's calculated, and it's definitely premeditated. It has the heightened sense of premeditation."
The state argued that none of the mitigating circumstances, like Nealy's childhood trauma, reported mental health issues, his age or his confession outweigh the aggregating factors in the three murders.
"Did he confess? Sure, he did," Sarabia said. "But number one, why'd he do that? Because, he was caught. He thought the game was already over and now, at that point, control the narrative, enjoy the attention."
Pictured: Shelby Nealy's interview with a detective in January 2019.
Prosecutors also pointed to the support Nealy received from his mother and stepfather, and the behavioral issues throughout his life.
The other side:
Nealy's defense asked for mercy, not for Nealy, but for his children and family.
"Shelby killed Jamie, Richard, Laura and Nicholas, and it is the most horrific, inexcusable thing that he could do," Nealy's attorney Bjorn Brunvand said.
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During closing statements, the defense said Nealy was the victim of domestic violence in his and Jamie's relationship.
"Jamie was having a psychotic moment," Brunvand said. "She was threatening him with a knife. She was threatening to kill his daughter, and after having been beat up again and again and again, he defended his daughter and himself. Did he take it too far? He may have."
The defense said the facts of this case are not so simple.
"Every horrific act that he did was that so that in his mind, he could get his kids and keep his kids, because he couldn't bear the thought of being without them," Brunvand said.
Nealy's attorney says that after Jamie's death, Nealy didn't know what to do and couldn't tell anyone what happened.
The defense said there are mitigating circumstances to consider in this case.
"It's understandable for a jury to view Shelby Nealy as a monster based on what he did, but at the same time, we can also recognize that he is a fellow human being who has purpose, who can do good things for others," Brunvand said.
Nealy's attorney also pointed to his longstanding mental health issues and traumatic brain injury that he suffered at one point.
What they're saying:
Following the death penalty verdict, the Ivancic family released a joint statement that said, in part, "While no sentence can ever bring back our loved ones, today justice demanded accountability—the highest accountability. We are grateful that the jury delivered it."
What's next:
The next step is a "Spencer Hearing," which will give Nealy a chance to provide additional evidence to change the penalties imposed by sentencing. That is scheduled for December 9.
The Source: This story was written using information from testimony at Shelby Nealy's sentencing trial in Pinellas County, Florida, with additional details from previous FOX 13 News reports.