GREEN COVE SPRINGS, Fla. – Testimony began Monday in the long-delayed retrial of a man accused of raping and murdering a veterinary technician in Orange Park in 2007.
Michael Renard Jackson was originally convicted and sentenced to death in 2010, but the Florida Supreme Court threw out the verdict after finding detectives made prejudicial comments on the stand.
In January 2007, Andrea Boyer, 25, was found dead at the veterinary practice where she worked around 6:30 a.m. — soon after she usually opened the clinic.
On Monday, the state began calling witnesses who spoke about the day of the murder. One of those witnesses was Joy Danielle Choates, who worked with Boyer. She described how another colleague reacted upon finding Boyer at the kennel that morning.
“She was hysterical,” said Choates, who was emotional recalling that moment more than a decade later.
She also testified money in the cash register was missing.
Jackson was arrested and charged soon after the murder. He had previously been convicted of rape and sentenced to 30 years in prison but was released early.
The state had previously argued Boyer was a random victim, while attorneys for Jackson argued that the suspect and victim knew each other and that the sex was consensual.
Witness Kelly Whittenton testified that Boyer and Jackson were both regulars at the Clay County convenience store she managed in 2007, but she never saw the two of them speak.
“I don’t even recall seeing them on the property at the same time,” Whittenton said.
The murder weapon, according to prosecutors, was a fire extinguisher. A fight over the DNA testing of the fire extinguisher on which the suspect’s DNA was found, as well as the pandemic, led the retrial to be rescheduled several times until finally getting underway 16 years after Boyer’s death, with a jury being seated last week in the retrial.
The second day of testimony will begin Tuesday morning at the Clay County Courthouse.