They sold the boat. They went out for what was supposed to be a final test run with the buyer. They never came back to shore.
A Retirement Built Around the Sea
Thomas Hawks, 57, and his wife, Jackie, 47, had spent years working toward an active, adventurous retirement. Tom had worked as a probation officer in Yavapai County, Arizona, and was an experienced boater and surfer who'd built his first small boat as a teenager. After selling their home in 2001, the couple bought a 55-foot yacht they named "Well Deserved" and spent nearly two years sailing the coast of Baja California and the Sea of Cortez.
When their first grandchild was born back in Arizona, Tom and Jackie decided to end their voyage and sell the yacht themselves to avoid broker fees, listing it for roughly $435,000 to $440,000.
A Buyer Who Wasn't What He Seemed
In November 2004, a young man calling himself Skylar Deleon responded to the listing. The Hawkses were initially wary of him, but grew more comfortable after meeting his pregnant wife, Jennifer, and their young child. Deleon — born John Julius Jacobson Jr., and using a name he had legally adopted years before any of this — claimed to have the money from a former career as a child actor and some real estate dealings.
What the Hawkses didn't know was that Deleon, along with several associates, had already planned to murder them and take the boat and their savings.
A Test Run That Became a Murder
On November 15, 2004, Tom and Jackie took the yacht out of Newport Beach harbor with Deleon and two other men, John Fitzgerald Kennedy and Alonso Machain, for what was framed as a final test sail before the sale. Jennifer wasn't aboard.
According to testimony later given by Machain, once the boat was out at sea, Deleon and Kennedy overpowered Tom in the kitchen and handcuffed him. When Jackie came down to investigate the commotion, Machain held her at gunpoint after a struggle and brought her to join Tom. The couple were bound, blindfolded, and forced to sign documents transferring ownership of the yacht — during which, according to testimony, Jackie deliberately misspelled her own name in hopes someone reviewing the paperwork later would notice something was wrong.
We're not going to walk through the full, extended sequence of what happened to Tom and Jackie aboard that boat — it's documented at length in court records and news coverage for those who want that level of detail. What's necessary to understand here is the outcome: both Tom and Jackie were bound together with rope, tied to the yacht's anchor, and pushed into the water off Santa Catalina Island. According to Machain's testimony, Jackie was pleading for her life in her final moments, while Tom tried to comfort her.
Afterward, the men searched the yacht for valuables before returning to shore.
An Investigation That Moved Quickly
When Tom and Jackie's family reported them missing, investigators searched the yacht and found a receipt for cleaning supplies purchased just after the couple disappeared — the kind of purchase a detective on the case would later describe as exactly what someone would buy if they needed to clean up a crime scene. The Hawkses' missing SUV also helped lead investigators directly to Deleon.
Initially, Deleon claimed he had legitimately purchased the boat and that the Hawkses had simply left with their payment. He later suggested they might have been killed over an unrelated drug deal. Machain, who had briefly fled to Mexico, eventually confessed and was arrested alongside Deleon and Jennifer in March 2005.
Investigators also connected Deleon to a separate 2003 murder, that of an associate named Jon Jarvi, killed on a road near Ensenada, Mexico.
Convictions
Several people were ultimately charged in connection with the case. Jennifer Henderson (formerly Jennifer Deleon) was convicted in 2006 of two counts of murder and sentenced in October 2007 to two consecutive terms of life in prison without parole — despite not being present on the boat, prosecutors argued she had played an equally central role in planning the killings.
Skylar Deleon was convicted in 2008 on multiple counts of murder, including special-circumstance findings for multiple murders and murder for financial gain. A jury recommended the death penalty, and he was formally sentenced in 2009. John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the third man directly involved in the killings aboard the boat, was also convicted and sentenced to death. Two other men connected to the case, Alonso Machain and Myron Sandora Gardner Sr., accepted plea deals in exchange for testifying against the others; Machain pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter.
Tom and Jackie's son, Ryan, called the eventual verdict against Deleon "a big relief" after years of legal proceedings.
Where Things Stand Now
Skylar Deleon, now legally known as Skylar Sophia Deleon, remains incarcerated on death row at San Quentin State Prison. In 2023, while still on death row, Deleon underwent gender-affirming surgery covered through California's prison healthcare system — a development that drew significant national news coverage and political debate in 2024 regarding state policy on medical care for incarcerated individuals. California has maintained a moratorium on carrying out executions under Governor Gavin Newsom, meaning Deleon's death sentence, like those of other condemned inmates in the state, is unlikely to be carried out in the foreseeable future regardless of how appeals proceed.
Jennifer Henderson and John Fitzgerald Kennedy both remain incarcerated as well, serving their respective sentences.
The case was the subject of an ABC "20/20" episode titled "Overboard" and has continued to draw true crime coverage in the years since, both for the brutality of what happened aboard the Hawkses' own yacht and for how methodically the entire plot had been planned before they ever agreed to the sale.
Sources
Murders of Thomas and Jackie Hawks — Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murders_of_Thomas_and_Jackie_Hawks
JURY RECOMMENDS DEATH PENALTY FOR MAN CONVICTED OF MURDER-FOR-PROFIT KILLING OF NEWPORT BEACH COUPLE ON THEIR YACHT — Orange County District Attorney
https://orangecountyda.org/press/jury-recommends-death-penalty-for-man-convicted-of-murder-for-profit-killing-of-newport-beach-couple-on-their-yacht/
Skylar Deleon and Jennifer Deleon Now: Where Are They Today? — The Cinemaholic
https://thecinemaholic.com/where-are-skylar-deleon-and-jennifer-deleon-now/