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Killer Expresses Regret A Decade After Helping Girl Kill Mom

Tribune photo by COLIN HACKLEY

Jon Whispel shows the tattoo he received while on the run from the law after helping kill Vicki Robinson nearly 10 years ago.

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By VALERIE KALFRIN | The Tampa Tribune

Published: June 26, 2008

Related Links

• Jail Interview: Jon Whispel
• The Valessa Diaries
• Looking Back

  Vicki and Valessa Robinson

Jon Whispel wears his regrets on his arms, tattooed in a skull and two masks.

The grinning skull sits high enough on his bicep to hide beneath the short sleeves of his blue prison shirt. He bought the tattoo in Ybor City a decade ago today with money from a woman he had helped kill hours earlier.

"I was an idiot," Whispel, now 29, said of the skull and more.

The laughing and crying masks etched on his inner forearms while in prison summarize his life: Laugh now, cry later, he said.

Whispel once dreamed of joining the Army while skipping school to hit Clearwater Beach. Then he met Adam Davis. Davis' girlfriend, Valessa Robinson, was just 15 at the time. Her mother, Vicki, was "anything a kid would look for in a mom," Whispel said.

On June 27, 1998, Vicki Robinson, 49, stepped into her kitchen in a nightgown. Whispel twice testified about how Davis attacked her there, how Valessa Robinson held her mother down while Davis slashed at the woman's throat with a bleach-filled syringe, how he handed Davis a knife. They dumped Robinson's body in a trash can about six miles from her Carrollwood home and fled Tampa before being captured in Texas five days later.

At first, no one who knew Vicki Robinson could imagine what happened to her. Once investigators found her body, people around the Bay area were stunned. How could a daughter treat her mother like that?

Convicted of third-degree murder, Valessa Robinson is now 25. She lives at Gadsden Correctional Facility in Quincy.

She hasn't spoken publicly about her mother's death in years, but she has struggled often with guilt, said her attorney, Dee Ann Athan. They last spoke about a year ago.

"No matter what anybody thinks about any of this, this was traumatic for her," Athan said. At times, "she said to me, 'I should've been able to save my mother.' "

Athan told her she was right; she wasn't a hero, but that so few people are.

Nearly nine years into a 25-year sentence for second-degree murder, Whispel also has no answers for what troubles him most.

"I always think about why. Why I didn't stop it?" Whispel said. "It eats at me every day. Because by me not stopping it, not only have I hurt another family, but I've also hurt my family at the same time."

'The Perfect Storm'

Whispel lives at Okaloosa Correctional Facility in the Panhandle. He met Valessa Robinson and Davis in 1997, through "a redheaded dude out on the street." They clicked over dropping acid, he said.

Davis had the nickname "Rattlesnake." His father had died in 1994; his mother was seldom in his life. He was 19 when he and Valessa began dating.

Valessa lived on a cul-de-sac on Cartnal Avenue in Carrollwood with an older sister, Michelle, then 17, her mother, a ferret and a dog. Vicki Robinson was a divorced real-estate agent and devout Christian.

Sexually active at 13 and using drugs, Valessa fell hard for Davis, who also used drugs and was on probation, Athan said.

Prosecutors said Vicki Robinson didn't approve of the relationship and arranged to put her daughter in a boarding school. But Athan said that disapproval was hidden. After finding Davis naked in Valessa's bedroom, for instance, Vicki Robinson allowed him in the house and ran errands with him and Whispel, she said.

"There were no consequences in this house. Everything just kind of happened," Athan said. "It was kind of like the brewing of the perfect storm."

Michelle Robinson was visiting her father in Missouri the evening of June 26, 1998, when Whispel, Davis and Valessa Robinson were high at a Denny's restaurant in Carrollwood. Valessa blurted out, "Let's kill my mom," Whispel said.

"The way she said it was how Vicki was, you know, bubbly and vivacious," he said. "She was smiling. To me, it looked like she was kidding, like a prank."

Davis took her seriously, Whispel said. "Once it entered his mind, I guess you could say the light bulb went on that he wanted to get rid of what he thought was a problem," Whispel said.

Perhaps Davis saw an end to his freedom at the Robinson house in Vicki Robinson's deepening relationship with her boyfriend of two years, Athan said.

When they returned to the house, Vicki Robinson awoke upon hearing them enter. Davis attacked her in the kitchen. Whispel said Valessa held down her mother during the struggle, which Athan disputes. "Jon's original interview [with detectives] doesn't talk about Valessa at all," she said. "Adam was sitting on top of Vicki."

Davis tried the syringe, then a knife that Whispel testified he handed to Davis. Whispel now says he admitted to that act to spare himself the death penalty.

"He's always considered himself the one who is not that much at fault," Athan said. "He's the one who went back to the bedroom, got the knife and said, 'Here, use this.' "

Whispel said what he didn't do plagues him. "I should've stepped up and said, 'Hold on. Wait. No. This ain't cool. This ain't the road to go down.' Why I didn't, I don't know," he said.

Fleeing West

They cleaned up the house and dumped Vicki Robinson's body in a wooded area near Waters Avenue. Later that day, they drove to Ybor City in her 1994 Nissan Quest van for drugs and tattoos.

The tattoo artist testified about how Valessa Robinson was shaking so badly, he thought she was coming off heroin, Athan said.

That evening, Vicki Robinson's boyfriend became concerned after not hearing from her and called the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office. Investigators noticed few signs of trouble at the house, but "we knew that something was awry," sheriff's Maj. John Marsicano said.

They tracked the activity on Vicki Robinson's bank card and wondered if the mother and daughter had been kidnapped. Meanwhile, the teenagers struck out for Arizona, where Davis knew someone who might help them get to Canada.

They were headed west on Interstate 10 through Pecos County, Texas, on July 2, 1998, when deputies chased them, responding to an alert about the van. A deputy shot out the tires during a high-speed chase.

Hillsborough County sheriff's Sgt. Jim Iverson and Marsicano rushed to Texas to interview the teens. On tape, Valessa Robinson and Davis each said she or he had stabbed Vicki Robinson. The investigators later thought Valessa lied about stabbing her mother to protect Davis. Even so, her involvement shocked them.

"It was kind of hard to visualize," said Iverson, who had a daughter Valessa's age at the time.

Athan remembered visiting Valessa at a jail clinic soon after her return to Tampa. She had lost so much weight, she had stopped menstruating. "Think of a 15-year-old in love. That was her mindset for a long time," she said. "All she wanted was to exonerate Adam."

A mother of three daughters, Athan said she couldn't help but feel protective toward the girl. "What would Vicki want? I don't know. But I would want somebody to fight for my child," she said. "I took care of her child the way I would want my child taken care of."

Life After Prison

The trials soon followed. Whispel testified first against Davis in 1999, then against Valessa Robinson in 2000. It was strange to see them in court, but "I wasn't ashamed," he said.

Davis was convicted of first-degree murder. Now on death row, he exhausted his final appeal to the state Supreme Court this month. He did not respond to a request for an interview.

If released in 2015, according to the Department of Corrections, Valessa Robinson will be 32. During her time in prison, she has occupied herself working in the laundry, cleaning up trash and training dogs. She's taken classes in architectural drafting, horticulture and wellness.

"I'm happy she'll be out one day," Athan said. "She's a very intelligent girl. She's a great writer. I hope she can have a life – if she wants children, have children. If she wants to get married, get married."

Michelle Robinson, who lives in Tampa, did not respond to a request for an interview. Other members of Vicki Robinson's family could not be reached.

"It's something we're trying to put behind us, and so is Valessa," Valessa's father, Charles Robinson of West Palm Beach, said when contacted by a reporter. He declined to talk further.

Memorial On His Arm

During jury deliberations at Valessa's trial, Whispel arranged to meet with Vicki Robinson's family to apologize. He said he felt compelled to speak to them.

He hasn't had any contact with Valessa Robinson or Davis over the years. A woman claiming to be Davis' fiancée wrote to him around 2002, asking him to recant, he said. He didn't respond.

Depending on credit he receives toward his sentence, Whispel said he could be released in 2019. He hopes to receive a transfer to a prison closer to the Bay area so his mother can visit. Their weekly phone conversations, he said, are honest and deep in a way they never were before.

Sometimes he thinks of the future, wondering who would hire a man with his record. He aspired to join the Army years ago and work as an underwater welder. Then he failed a drug test. He got caught hiding out in an abandoned house with Davis. He helped surprise Vicki Robinson after dark.

"If I could afford it, I would love to send some flowers to Vicki's grave, just because of the stupidness I was involved in," he said.

For now, the masks tattooed on his arms are "a little memorial for Vicki," he said.

"I'll see her later," Whispel said. "Hopefully, I'll make amends."

Reporter Valerie Kalfrin can be reached at (813) 259-7800 or vkalfrin@tampatrib.com.

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