Staff report
GAINESVILLE, Fla. – Kivi Jacquis Ellis, 31, will spend 75 years in state prison after pleading nolo contendere, or no contest, in a case involving the fatal shootings of a woman and an infant and the attempted killing of a third person.
Original incident
Gainesville Police Department officers were called to the 2900 block of NE 17th Drive at about 4:51 p.m. on December 4, 2020, after reports of gunfire. When they arrived, they found Ellis, identified as the shooter, still in the roadway.
According to witnesses, Ellis fired “numerous gunshots” at an adult woman in the front yard of the home they shared with three children, ages 5 years, 3 years, and 3 months. The woman was holding the infant when the shooting began. After she was struck and fell to the ground, Ellis continued firing. During the attack, the baby was shot in the head and killed.
Investigators said Ellis then picked up the infant and went to the back yard, where he “discarded the child’s body near a dog kennel.” He later returned to the front yard and again opened fire on the adult female victim.
Ellis also walked down the street and shot at a third victim, who was not hit. Officers arrived as that was unfolding, and after Ellis dropped the firearm, they took him into custody.
Emergency personnel attempted lifesaving measures at the scene, but the woman and infant were both pronounced dead. Police found the two older children hiding under a bed inside the residence; both had been present during the shooting.
Ellis reportedly made several spontaneous statements to officers, including saying he was sorry and that he had “killed them both.”
Pre-trial motions and notice of incompetence
As Ellis’s scheduled August 31 trial approached, his attorneys filed a motion requesting individual interviews with jurors to determine their views on the death penalty and another motion that would have prevented the prosecution from striking jurors who were opposed to the death penalty. Judge James Colaw denied both motions.
On August 28, the defense filed a “Notice of the Defendant’s Incompetence to Proceed,” arguing that Ellis’s mental health had deteriorated as they had tried to prepare him for the guilt phase of the trial. The attorneys said that Ellis became unable to answer questions about the incident or provide information about evidence. They wrote that when photographs of the victims were shown during a hearing, Ellis had appeared to want to leave the courtroom but had seemed to be unable to ask to leave: he “wished to absent himself of body and then absented himself of mind to preserve his fragile mind.” The attorneys wrote that Ellis would not speak with his attorneys and had not consented to various medical procedures such as a scan for an organic brain injury because he believed there was a conspiracy.
Defense attorneys wrote that Ellis was narrowly found incompetent to proceed in 2022, and they presented a recent evaluation finding that Ellis was incompetent to proceed; the doctor noted that Ellis had questionable capacity to disclose pertinent facts to his attorneys, questionable capacity to testify coherently, and unacceptable capacity to behave appropriately in the courtroom.
Plea agreement and sentence
On August 31, Ellis signed a petition to enter a plea, attesting that he was competent to enter the plea despite listing four mental health diagnoses.
He entered a plea of nolo contendere to two counts of second-degree murder (a lesser included offense) and one count of attempted first-degree murder without a firearm (a lesser included offense). According to the plea document, the maximum sentence for the charges is life in prison, with a minimum mandatory sentence of 25 years.
Judge James Colaw sentenced Ellis to 50 years in prison for one second-degree murder charge and a concurrent 30-year sentence for the second second-degree murder charge; Judge Colaw added a 25-year sentence for the attempted first-degree murder charge, which will be served after the 50-year sentence. Ellis has credit for 2,097 days served.
A note on the score sheet states that the sentence “amounts to a life sentence” and was agreed to by the victim’s family. Ellis is prohibited from any contact with the victim’s family or his own biological children until they are 18; he cannot have any unsupervised contact with minors.
