True Crime with Kimbyr - Part 2: Who Killed Makeva Jenkins After Her Inspiring Final Post?

Episode Date: June 19, 2026

The search for answers continues in part 2 of this heartbreaking case. In True Crime with Kimbyr, Kimbyrleigha dives deeper into the shocking murder of Makeva Jenkins, the successful mother whose life was taken inside her own home. As investigators piece together the terrifying home invasion, new questions emerge about the masked attacker, the abandoned getaway car, and the clues left behind. With a compassionate and analytical approach, this episode explores the investigation, the suspects, and the devastating aftermath of a crime that changed a family forever. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Detective Oliver blatantly asked if he thought that Tiffany could have been the person in the garage that night. And he's like, no, absolutely not. That was a man. He was not female. It was not Tiffany Webb. So Detective Oliver proved further and said, well, we know there was a rift between her and your wife. Could it may have been an associate of Tiffany's? Have you ever seen her hanging out with somebody that resembled the shooter? And that's when Yuri wanted to make something very clear. He's like, listen.

Like I said, I admit I messed up in the beginning of my marriage, and I regret that. But Tiffany was not a relationship. That's the point he wanted to get across. He explained that Tiffany was not someone he wanted anyone to know what about. He never brought her in public. And he said, she wasn't someone I wanted to be seen with if you know what I mean. He never met her family, never met any of her friends, and not any of her associates either. He went to her bedroom.

That's it. And he said it was a very brief thing. They met while he was in cosmetology school, which, by the way, McEva helped him get into and fund. So, of course, I think you can understand her heartache and sadness over what he had done. But he told the investigators, that was in the past. They worked on it.

Bottom line, sure, the women did not care for each other, but Tiffany wouldn't do that. And Tiffany said the same thing. She said, I hated the woman, but I didn't kill her. And she was cleared. They were able to confirm her alibi. She had nothing to do, nothing connected to this crime. But they do ask for everyone's cell phones.

And there's one thing about someone telling you about a relationship they had, and it's quite another thing to be able to read their text messages. They downloaded everyone's cell phones, Uri's, Demetri's, Quay's, and anyone related to this case. And they made sure to get everyone's phone number so they could cross-reference. But wait, I have to tell you about the car. Something suspicious came of the CCTV footage. This gave them their next lead.

So inside the car, I explained they found a black t-shirt and the keys. Well, they also ended up finding a few receipts. And three of them in particular were of interest to the detectives. They were from three different fast food restaurants in three different cities in the Palm Beaches, all from June 28th, which would be the day leading up to McKeever's murder. There was one from McDonald's at 4.19 p.m.,

and that one is in Riviera The next one was at Burger King and West Palm Beach at 9.06 p.m. And that's even closer to where McEva lived. And then at 10.34 p.m., there is one from a Miami subbs in Lake Worth, her exact city, right near her neighborhood. And initially, the detectives were like, well, Dimitri came that way. That's the car he drove. He already told the investigators he came down the way to play basketball. So he ate some food, big deal. Well, They just wanted to see who was driving. They pulled the cameras from one of the drive-thrus,

and only one of them had a shot of the driver. And it wasn't Dmitri. But there was a passenger in the car, and that could have been him. But they see a white Dodge Charger pull into Miami Subs at 10.30, and it breaks down. So now it makes sense why the car could have been on the side of the road. Right there at the window, as they're paying for their meal, The driver has to get out and start pushing the car

and he's able to get it pulled off to the side. Detectives were already told Demetri brought a friend to play basketball that day and his name was Jovan. They need to confirm if that's him. And where did he go after 10.30 p.m.? After the car broke down. And how did the car get back to Makiva's?

They had questions. And Dimitri had answers. He said, yeah, that's my friend Jovan. Jovan Joseph, also 19 years. years old. He had promised to give him a ride to Walmart that night. So he came with him that day to play basketball and they hung out until another friend came to get him. But before all of that, they went to the drive-thru, they broke down, they pulled over, got it running again, drove to McEvah's and Joe Vaughn left. Investors get Jovan's number and information so they can confirm all this and ask if he had heard or seen anything out of the ordinary when he was at McKevah's that night. But before they even had a chance to do that, they found CCTV. TV footage from a few businesses along the road where McKeiva's neighborhood entrance is on. And what they notice is the charger. It goes into the neighborhood at 208 a.m.

Nine minutes before the 911 call. And then at 218, the car leaves. So wait a minute. Who's driving it? Dmitri had claimed the gunman demanded the vehicle after he's running out the door. And Dmitri hands over his keys to his charge. But then who's driving when it comes into the neighborhood at 2 a.m.? Something's not adding up at all.

Now, they knew it couldn't have been Dimitri because Yuri and Quay confirmed that Dimitri was with them all day and into the evening before the gunman came in. And by the way, they had to interview these men multiple times because anything new that came up, they had to confirm and squared away, and Demetri says he has no idea. All he knows is he's not involved in anything that has had to have.

involved in anything that happened. He did not give anyone permission to use his car. But if that's true, how did his keys somehow get back in his pocket between the time the car pulls into the neighborhood and the time the gunman supposedly asked for the keys? And here are two teenagers, Dmitri and Javon, both 19, who haven't lived that much life. Both don't exactly have criminal records, but they both aren't in the best financial. situations either. And they found out that Dimitri had actually crashed that white charger about a week before this, and he owed money to fix it before he gave it back to the rental car agency. Detectives described Demetri as financially driven. They have their suspicions. So they go back to

Yuri. And even the mention of Demetri, the kid, he's known since he was a baby, Yuri isn't having it. He's like, no. There is no way Demetri is involved in this. He's like a stepson. McKeiva buys him presents for his birthday. He comes around a lot. And then the detectives confront Yuri about something that he finds to be odd. He said, the gunman made you guys get on the floor, right?

But he allowed Dimitri to get up and bring your son downstairs. Don't you think that's a little bit odd? And Yuri's like, I don't know. And then Detective Oliver continues, and he says, OK, well, did you know that he didn't take your son out of the house and go get help. And you're just like, what do you mean?

He took my son to the neighbor's house, and he called 911. Nope. Detective Oliver says, that happened later. Dimitri actually ran out of the house to the backyard, out the sliding glass door, into the enclosed pool area, which seems really weird. Like, why wouldn't you run out of the front door and go get help?

He comes to this house all the time. He knows his way around. It was only after the gunman, left, supposedly asking for Dmitri's keys, that he called 911 and went to the neighbors. Yuri finally agrees that that does not make sense. It does look odd. But there's shock, there's split-second decisions,

but it didn't sit right. If you genuinely believe that there was an armed intruder upstairs and you have an opportunity to run and get help, you're not going to go to the back of an enclosed yard. But if you did, maybe you would scream, you would hop over the fence, Hop over the fence, you would do something, but Dimitri does nothing. If Dimitri did come around a lot, he would know that McKeva was making money.

So could you have come up with a plan that went awry? Well, that's when he hits Yuri with the CCTV evidence. The story is that the gunman took the car after the shooting to flee the scene. But if that's true, who drove into the neighborhood in the first place? Because Dimitri was already inside the house. He's been there all evening. So if his car is pulling into the neighborhood at two while he's already inside,

obviously someone else is driving it. And not someone else came with a very specific purpose. The timeline's falling apart. The story's falling apart. And Dimitri Dale is in the middle of it. And again, Dimitri's brought in. He's still adamant. He has nothing to do with this.

He claims, if someone had his car, they got his keys somehow. He did not give them permission. What he doesn't know is they already pulled his phone records. And what the detective found was a very specific pattern. In the days leading up to the murder and in the days immediately after it, one phone number appears over and over again in Dimitri's call history and text history. More than almost anyone else.

And that's Jovan Joseph. And he happened to be the one he brought over Makiva's that day, but never before. Dimitri seems to break. He says, okay, it could be. Jovan could have stolen my car after I thought he left. So investigators start looking into Jovan Joseph. 19. No personal connections to McEva whatsoever.

Doesn't even know her. Doesn't know her family. Has no history with this household. No grievances. No reason to walk into that woman's bedroom and pull a trigger. Which immediately raises the question that Detective Oliver can't shake.

Why? Why would a 19-year-old with zero connection to this woman be in constant contact with Dimitri Dale in the days surrounding the murder? So they bring Jovan in for questioning. And the first thing the detective notices when Jovan walks through that door is his build, his height, his physical appearance, he looks exactly like the man on the Miami sub's footage that's pushing the car. He looks exactly like the description that every witness gave of the mass gunman. Yvonne sits down, he's cooperative. He says yes. He was at the Jenkins household earlier on June 28th.

He was with Dimitri during that day. They hung out in the garage, they played some basketball, nothing unusual. But he says he left and he never came back. He had nothing to do whatsoever with what happened that night. And where was he at 2 a.m.? He says he went to visit a girlfriend that he was seeing and that he was at the Good Samaritan Hospital between between 2 and 3 a.m. Detective Oliver checks.

And hospital surveillance does show Jovan Joseph in the lobby of Good Samaritan Hospital that night, but time stamps don't lie. It's after 3 a.m. when he arrives. More than enough time to have committed this killing. But Detective Oliver needs more than a gap in a timeline. He needs to put Jovan at the scene. He already knows these teenagers are lying to him because keys can't pop back in Dimitri's pocket between 208 and right after the gunman shoots Makiva. He already gave Jovan the keys. That's the theory. He just has to dig deeper. So he brings Quay back in. And he says, take a look at Jovan again. And that's when he's like, wait a minute. Yes. Not only does he fit the physical description, he remembered him talking that day and even his voice sounds like the gunmen did.

He goes over that day again with the detective. All of it. He said he got to Yuri's before anyone else got there. Dimitri brings his friend Jovan for the very first time. They all play basketball together. But now he remembers something very odd. At the time, it didn't really seem that important. But after they were done, he saw Demetri and Jovan at the end of the driveway talking to one another.

And Quay just walks up and they get completely silent. He didn't think anything was. of it, like I said, but now he's putting it all together, and that's suspicious. Like, they had a secret between them that they didn't want to share with Quay. There's a lot detectives need to connect. They think they're on the right track, but it's time to do something really important. They need to lay Makiva to rest. Just a few days after her death, McKeva's funeral is held at Brown's funeral home.

The choir from the very church where she and Yuri first met on New Year's Eve performs, the same church where their love story began. Quay sits in the front row next to Yuri, and for Quay, it's almost unbearable seeing his sister lying in that casket. He kissed her, he whispered to her that he would always love her, and he will look out for her children, that he will miss her every single day for the rest of his life. And Yuri sat there quietly, clutching his phone, and at one point he played a recording on Bikiva's voice and let it feel. the room. No one could hold back tears, except maybe Yuri, because he doesn't look like he's crying, not visibly, not in a way that everyone around him can see. Now again, grief is not one-size-fits-all.

We know that people process loss in so many different ways, and some of those ways may not make sense to the people watching. But for the people who love Makiva deeply, who knew her, and knew what she meant to the people in that room, something about watching her. her husband sit there with dry eyes silently while her voice played on his phone just didn't sit right. They couldn't explain it. They just felt it. And Quay, knowing the direction the detectives were going in, that Dimitri, someone Yuri had brought around his family, could be responsible.

It felt so wrong. Like, why? Why didn't you be more careful of who you brought around? Detectives were thinking the same thing, but in another sense. Our phones are our lifelines, but they can also be the death of an alibi. A fake one, that is, because phone records bust this case open. It took months to put this together. This did not happen overnight, but finally, they got what they were looking for.

Jovonne's GPS put him exactly at McEvahs at the time of the shooting. His phone pinged right near the Jenkins home twice. The first time during the day on June 28th, which matches his story about being there earlier to hang out. Second time was at 208 a.m. on June 29th. Javan Joseph is brought back in again, and the detective puts that cell phone tower data right in front of him and asks him to explain why his phone was pinging near the Jenkins home

in the early morning hours when he said he was nowhere near there. He has no explanation, none, and that's not good. On September 2nd of 2017, just over two months after MacGiva was killed, Detective Sean Oliver arrest Jovan Joseph and charged him with first-degree murder. And as he's being walked without police car in handcuffs, Jovan keeps saying the same thing over and over again, I didn't do it. But the cell tower data says otherwise.

The Miami sub's footage says otherwise. The timeline says otherwise. And investigators are just, just getting started, and this is the part I love, just all the things that they collected so that they can close this case. Jovan truly had no motive, no reason to walk into a stranger's house,

and she would a pregnant woman in her sleep, which means to detectives, somebody put him up to this. And Detective Oliver has never been comfortable with Dimitri Dale from the start. Something about him just didn't feel right. Dmitri is not just a witness. Detective Oliver is sure of it. And eventually the pressure becomes too much.

And Dimitri breaks. He said it's true. Jovan told him at gunpoint to drive him to McEvas that day. He was like, why? He didn't say McEvas. He said, drive me to Uri's. And that's when he pulled out the gun and told him, you better do it.

And he listened. And later, Jovan never left. He stayed in Demetri's car out in that driveway. So all along he knew. He knew the shooter was Jovan. but he distanced himself from all of it. When looking through everyone's phone records, detectives see all those calls between Dimitri and Jovan,

but also from Jovan to another number that doesn't belong to anyone. Nobody that gave them their phones or their information. So what they do is they subpoena the records from that phone number, and they found out it's a ZTE phone under a contract with track phone. It was purchased from Walmart on June 27th at 1018 p.m. two days before the murder, not even two days. It was a burner phone.

And what was interesting is that this burner phone made calls to Tiffany Webb, Uri's ex-girlfriend, the mother of his other son, the one that McKeva didn't like, the one he swore had nothing to do with her murder. Detectives didn't think she did, but they think Uri might have. It only made sense. He's the closest person to McEva. He knows her schedule.

He knows how much money she makes. He would be the one talking to Tiffany. So they bring Yuri in and blatantly ask him whether any other phone numbers were going to come up to his name besides his iPhone. And that's when he says, oh, well, a couple months ago, I got a track phone because my wife got mad that, you know, people that I was cutting hair,

they would call late at night for my business. So I got a second line. and I just keep it out in the garage. When asked if he ever used that truck phone to speak to Tiffany, he admitted he did, but it was only for child support. He explained, it was really tough. I needed to communicate with Tiffany about my son because McEvo would get mad.

And then he inserts a story about a time when he was driving by where Tiffany lived with his son and he saw that their apartment building was on fire and all he could think about was his son lived there and he had to stop and he had to make a call. to Tiffany and Makiva found out. And he said he literally had to get on his knees and tell her,

I swear, I'm not cheating on you. I don't even have time to cheat. I'm with you 24-7. It was about my son. I wanted to make sure it was okay. And Makiva understood that. But the track phone allowed him not to have to run everything by her, according to him.

That sounds fine. But the problem is he didn't get it two months before this. He got it under two days before his first. before his wife's murder. And that phone was communicating with Jovan, a person that him and Quay said, they had never met before June 28th when he came over to play basketball.

They need the physical phone because they want to use Cellbrite to extract all of the data, because all they have right now is the call log. So they ask Yuri for it and he says, oh, it's out in my car. Hold on, let me go get it. When he walked out there, Detective Oliver already

had an officer, so smart, waiting at Yuri's vehicle, just in case. And when Yuri got there, the officer said, I'm here to collect the other phone. Yuri looked like he was caught off guard. Who knows what he was trying to pull? Was he going to say he didn't have the phone? Was he going to destroy it? Was he going to try to erase something? They're not sure, but their instincts were on point. Yuri's mom is sitting in the driver's seat of the car and he says to her, I'm looking for my phone. He leans into the car. He leans into the car. car into the passenger side. He's rummaging through the center console. He's acting as though he cannot locate it. And he says to his mom again, I'm looking for my phone. And she's sitting there

seeming like she's confused, like she doesn't know what he's talking about because he already gave his iPhone to police. And when he's leaning into the vehicle, the officer's scanning his body. And he's wearing cargo shorts. On the right side, the officer could see a shape of what looked like a phone in his pocket. So that officer, keeps his eye on it. And as Yuri stands up, the officer can clearly read the top of the phone and it says Z-T-E and the officer reaches inside, pulls out the track phone, shows it to Yuri and says, is this what you're looking for?

They already had a warrant, so it didn't matter. But it was like an I-Gotcha moment. Yuri was hiding something. That was clear. What? Another affair? Or worse? He put himself in their crosshairs and now they're looking at the last.

They're looking back on everything, and so is everyone else. First, there were these TV interviews shortly after Makiva's murder. Yuri agreed to sit down with local news stations and do interviews, and he talks about the kids, about raising them on their own without McKeva, about worrying about their daughter growing up without her, about navigating things like puberty without McKeva there to guide her. He refers to himself as a single black male and says he's a, or whatever you call it, or whatever you call it.

Nobody processes trauma the same way. We know that. And the last thing investigators want to do is convict someone in a court of public opinion based on how they look on a camera. But the people who love McEva, her friends, her family, they're watching this interview, and something feels wrong. He's not crying.

He doesn't even say he loves her. Doesn't even say he misses her. it feels detached, like he's already thinking logistics rather than sitting with the loss. My oldest daughter, she's taking it hard. My six-year-old, he knows, but he doesn't know. I held on my arm.

She was alive. And my baby girl, she don't really know what's going on. She's one year old. She'll never get a chance to see her mom when she gets older, when she gets her menstrual cycle, I don't know what to do. It's going to be tough, especially than a black male, a single black male, widower, or whatever you should call it, but it's going to be hard.

Very hard. Very hard. The public reacts immediately. Comment sections are exploding. People have never met either of these people are convinced he has something to do with her murder, just from watching that interview. It's kind of giving me like the sermon on the porch, Chris Watts, If you know, you know, if you don't, that was the man who killed his wife, his pregnant wife, and his two children. Chris Watts was a monster, and Yuri is starting to look less like a grieving

husband and more like a man with a motive. And then it comes out. Yuri went to a strip club like two or three days after his wife was killed. And he even posted about it on social media. His wife had just been murdered. She was barely, in the ground, and he's out spending money on other women. Well, he doesn't even know if there's a killer out there coming to harm him and his other children. He had multiple affairs. There were multiple women in his life that were coming forward, and it comes out that

Yuri literally told people he didn't love Makiva. And I was thinking, well, leave. Dimitri even has to admit that he's heard Yuri say it before. Looking over that video of him talking to the meeting. He's doing the dry cry. The rubbing of the eyes with no tears, that's a classic sign. That you're performing grief, you're not experiencing it. On what would have been, McKeva's 34th birthday, August 8th of 2017,

her family stands before cameras in the public pleading for answers. They're wearing shirts with her face on it, with the word sleep in peace. Crime Stoppers announces a $3,000 reward for information leading to an arrest. her grandma's there. The woman who raised her, speaking through tears, about her granddaughter. She described as loved by everybody that knew her, said she couldn't think of a single person who would have a reason to hurt Makiva and that they just needed closure. But guess who's not there? Yuri. And when reporters ask where he is, the family says they don't know. Another thing, the autopsy revealed at this point that McKeever was eight weeks pregnant. And Detective Oliver specifically goes back

to Yuri and he says, why did you never mention the pregnancy in any of your interviews? And Yuri's like, I thought I did. Well, Detective Oliver found that deeply suspicious. That isn't a detail you forget to mention. It's not something that would slip your mind. That's your wife and your unborn child. Unless, of course, the pregnancy wasn't something you wanted. And maybe you didn't want anyone looking too closely at that. Law enforcement lets your ego, but now they're a laser focused on him. And on McKeva's life insurance, because on June 7th, she posted on Facebook saying this, quote, cover your family with life insurance. Death is inevitable, no matter how it comes.

Cover your family with life insurance. It's affordable, but does it really matter the cost when you're not? it comes to making sure you have the proper insurance to cover funeral expenses when the time comes. Express your loved ones the importance of having life insurance. Everyone in my house is covered because I know if a tragedy happened, I can't just spit out $13,000 or more for a funeral." End quote. Now, McKeva actually tagged her insurance agent Karen Halloway at Northwestern Mutual Insurance Company, saying, this is my good. go-to girl, but you can choose whoever you want. Just get it. Well, the theory about someone paying

close attention to McKeiva's social media accounts was true, but it wasn't a stranger. It was the man sleeping in her bed, the husband that she said she was so blessed to have, who's supposed to be a pastor's son, the one wearing matching t-shirts with Bible verses on them. Yeah. That was something he did a lot. He wore shirts with Psalms 13 or infusions on and outwardly expressing this was a man of God, but instead, he was a man who wanted to play God. He wanted to dictate who lived and who died because, as McKeva said, death is inevitable, no matter how it comes.

And she was covered by insurance. Her life was valuable to Yuri, but only if it was taken. That's the way he cashes in on her earnings, her hard work. It made perfect sense to Detective Oliver. He was the link between Dimitri and Jovan. Yuri was the mastermind. Yuri had admitted to investigators that he paid $700 a month for two kids for child support, plus he owed back pay to Tiffany in the amount of $5,000.

McKeva didn't have one life insurance policy. She had two. One that she purchased on June 1st of 2000. for $180,000 and one with Northwestern that went into effect back on February 27th of the same year, 2017. And that one was for half a million dollars. So the investigators reach out to both of these companies,

and sure enough, guess what? They record their phone calls. And guess who called them back on July 5th? Yuri. He called Northwestern the bigger policy that had, you know, half a million. He was trying to confirm whether he was the beneficiary. What's interesting is in one of the very first interviews that detectives had with him, they asked him if his wife had life insurance. And this man acted like he didn't even know. He said, you know, when she used to talk to me about that kind of thing and she wanted to ask me questions, I wasn't interested. So he didn't know.

Really? Well, like I said, calls recorded. I have a portion of it that has been released to the public, and I'll place some of that for you, but I also pulled all the court records, and I have the entire written transcript. He tells the agent, he does not have money to pay for McEva's funeral,

and that the funeral director told him to look into whether she had a policy. And now he just needs to know if he's the beneficiary because he needs the money. He let them know that he's pressed for time because the funeral director wants information that day. The representative simply asked him for his name, his address, and his birth date, which Yuri provided, and then she asked who passed away. He said, McKeiva, McKeva Jenkins, my wife.

And the representative gives her condolences. She says, I'm so sorry for your loss, sir. Let me get you over to our life benefits area, and they'll be able to help you. And so he's transferred. An agent named Carrie comes on the line, introduces herself, and then she confirms that he's MacGiva's spouse. He says yes. And then she says, unfortunately, she cannot give him any information about the policy. It's confidential. She can only release that information to the beneficiary on file. And he's not listed as the beneficiary. and I can only speak to an official file. Okay, I'm going to figure out who.

Oh, wow. Damn, I'm sure that that was a shock. Well, we know it was because of what he said next. It was chilling. He's like, oh, wow, I got to figure out who and she didn't change it in time. In time for what? Her murder? If that's not damning, I don't know what is.

The beneficiary was the woman who stepped in to raise Makiva, her grandmother, Gloria. Akiva was smart. She knew not to put the palsy in her man's name. She taught seminars on this stuff, yet Yuri thought he was a smart one. She was looking out for her kids. After all this, Dmitri is brought back in because they think that under pressure, with all the evidence they've now collected, that he will finally admit that this was all the plan, especially when they show him a note that Jovan's mom found after he was arrested.

It was a letter titled Game Plan that Jovan wrote in case anything were to happen to him. It laid everything out how he was contracted by Yuri to kill Makiva. Give him a gun, gave him $1,500 in cash up front, and he was promised $20,000 when Yuri collected the life insurance funds. There was even a voice recording found, where Jovan is admitting that he got $1,500.

So Dimitri spills all. You lied to me so many f***. No worries. I'm tired of being lied to? I'm not lying to. In a nutshell. Yuri tells you he's going to kill his wife. Two, you bring Javon to meet him.

Three, Javon is in the back. You get delivered, you deliver Javon by your own. words, to the scene within nine minutes of the murder, you admit to me that it's Javan that commits the murder. In a nutshell, without going in all detail. It goes like this. Uri reached out to Dmitri, asked him if he knew anyone that could commit the crime. Dmitri reaches out to Jovan and connects Jovan and Yuri.

Dmitri agrees to help investigators. He agrees to have a recorded phone conversation with Yuri Jenkins and turn the recordings over to investigators. And what happens on those calls is almost hard to believe. Uri doesn't know he's being recorded, just like before, I guess. And in multiple conversations with Dmitri, he says things that no innocent man would ever say. Every time Dmitri uses Yuri's name on the call, Yuri stops him immediately and said, don't use my name. Don't say my name. He tells Dmitri their secret is safe, that he will never turn on him and that he will never

turn on Jovan either. He says police don't have any evidence that they're fine. And and that they just need to stay calm and stay quiet. How ironic is that that you're telling all, but you think all you have to do is be quiet? When Dimitri asked him if whether Yuri would have his back, if he ends up locked up over this, Yuri says, without a shadow of a doubt. Without a shadow of a doubt.

That is not how an innocent man talks. It's not how a grieving husband talks. This is how a man talks when he knows exactly what happened, exactly why and exactly who made it happen. Now, after this, Jovan agrees to a proffer, which is just a way of saying that he is going to offer up more information to reduce his sentence. He admits it's all true.

Uri hired him to kill Makiva. And that's all they need to arrest Yuri Jenkins. You know you're underwent, right? And it's because of the evidence says, got it. People rolled. I'm just going to be straight out with, People roll. What do you?

People roll. Javon? Dimitri. Rolled up on the and did what? They gave up information. What kind of information?

Well, the fact that you contracted Javon to do this. That's what he says. Oh, how about this? Do you know, remember talking to Dale?

I'm sure you kind of figured that Dale was probably recording on your conversations. Yeah. He tells you that Javan is

telling people that he did it and you're telling him tell the boy to be quiet. I don't want to go to jail. He's telling you that that Javon killed your wife and that at one point of you have said.

I don't. For something I know Why didn't kill her? You didn't kill her. But you had her, feel. On December 16th of 2017, six months after McKeeva was shot in her sleep, her husband, Yuri Jenkins, is taken into custody and charged with first-degree murder.

And as he's being transported, he tells reporters that God will vindicate him. Yuri, did you kill your wife? No, I didn't. You said you were innocent. I am innocent. And then what happened? God will vindicate me.

What do you have to say about this hearing? This is the bull-boh. God vindicate me. You say you're innocent? I'm innocent. Yes, I am. And everything changes. Because now it's not a stranger who did this.

It's not a random act of violence. It's not a dealer looking for a quest. It's the man that McEva married. The man she walked down that aisle with. The man she posted about six days before this calling him her soulmate. For people who knew them both personally, or even watched them on social media, that level of betrayal,

it's even hitting me right now because it's impossible to even process when you sit and think about it. Quay couldn't believe that it was true. They considered Yuri family. They never thought he could do anything like this. And that's why these kind of cases are so terrifying because there she was,

smiling for the camera, living her life, bringing a new life into this world, and her own husband is plotting her murder? If that's not sick, I can't tell you what is. The first attempt at trial is in January 2020. Yuri pleads not guilty. They get all the way through jury selection, and then everything falls apart.

What happened is that some of McEva's family members are overheard by these potential jurors saying that Yuri did it. Yuri's guilty, and just like that, a mistrial before it really even started. And then in April of 2020, they were gearing up again and COVID shut everything down. Nearly five years after McKeiva was shot in her sleep, the trial begins in April of 2022. And I know the trial part can kind of drag on sometimes, but I'm telling you right now, if you want to know even a little bit about what this man was thinking and why he did this,

continue listening. Your jaw will hit the floor. From the beginning, both sides were very clear on their position. The prosecution's argument is straightforward. Yuri Jenkins wanted out of the marriage. He wanted out with no consequences, no child support, no divorce, no division of assets, no losing the house, the life that his wife built,

and he knew she had a $500,000 life insurance policy sitting right there, and Makiva was talking about leaving him. So he found a middleman. And the middleman found a gunman, and the three of them conspired to murder a pregnant woman while she slept. What investigators pieced together through interviews with people that were the closest to her is that in May of 2017, McKeva told Yuri she wanted a divorce.

She was done. Quay had been telling her to leave, and she was finally ready. And then she found out she was pregnant. And being who she was, a woman who believed in family, who wanted to give her children both parents, who had been pregnant, who had been pregnant, for this exact life for so long, she changed her mind. She decided to stay and try again. For McKeiva, that pregnancy was a sign, a reason to hold on. But for Yuri, it was a complication.

People close to this couple confirmed he wasn't happy about the pregnancy. And when you combine that with the potential divorce talk, the financial imbalance, the life insurance policy, you start to see exactly what kind of a pressure was building inside that marriage from Yuri's side. McKeiva stayed because of that baby, and Yuri killed her anyway. Now, the defense, they have a different strategy, and they commit to it completely. The defense attorney Greg Lerman, he stands up in front of the jury and he says, this case is about lies and liars, plain and simple, and I don't disagree.

And he's not wrong. His witnesses have complicated histories with the truth because the problem. prosecution's two key witnesses are Dmitry Dale and Javan Joseph. Two men who, by their own admission, lied again and again to investigators early on in this case and all throughout it. Two men who changed their story a number of times. And according to the defense, they only started to talk and tell the truth when they wanted to stay out of prison. What he wants to drive home is that these two men didn't find their conscience. They didn't want to do the right thing. They found a plea deal, and that is very different.

And the first person to take the stand was Demetri Dale himself, and he doesn't pretend to be something he's not. He acknowledges right away. He lied many times to investigators under oath because he was scared, and he was following instructions. And those instructions, according to him, came from Yuri Jenkins. He said Yuri told him what to say and what not to say. That's what he tells the jury.

He describes the moment that Yuri first brought this to him. They were at the house. Uri pulled him aside, asked him what would happen if he wanted to have someone killed? Demetri's like who? And Yuri said his wife. And here's the bombshell. Here's the reason, and I told you, your jaw is going to drop, why Yuri wanted McKeva dead. Demetri says something that makes this entire courtroom go silent. He says Yuri told him that one day, while he's in the shower with McKeva, he realized he couldn't become aroused. And in that moment, he said he understood

he no longer loved her. That's his reason? I could say so much, but I'm sure you're thinking it. Sounds like a personal problem. He was in the shower, he couldn't get it up, and then she had to die. When prosecutors asked Dimitri,

why he eventually decided to tell the truth. He said because McEva's family deserved justice. So that goes in. against what the defense was trying to say, that he only wanted to take a plea. He said he did not want to be the thing standing between this family and them getting justice. But the defense tears into him on cross-examination.

He calls out every single lie, every inconsistency, every moment where Dimitri's story shifted to fit whatever was the most convenient for him at the time. And Dimitri sits there and takes it. He has no choice. He can't argue that. And then Jovan Joseph takes the stand. He fills in the part of the story that only he can.

He tells the jury that Yuri hired him to kill Akiva. They agreed on the price of $20,000. He was paid roughly half of it up front. He describes the conversations where they discussed different methods, and this was very hard to hear. Different scenarios, ways to make it look like it was something other than what it really was. And on the night of the murder, Chauvin testifies that Yuri guided him through the house as he moved. moved upstairs.

Yuri was the one that motioned to which bedroom it was because it was dark. Jovan saw a figure in the bed, confirmed it was the woman he was there for, and he fired. And when the prosecutor asked him why he aimed for her head, Jovan answered without hesitation. He said, I was trying to finish the job. Members of McEva's family were crying out in that courtroom. It was just so cold. and the judge had to stop everything and give them a moment. And then Quay took the stand.

Quay has been holding all this together or trying to for so long, five years awaiting, of watching his sister's children grow up without her, sitting with the knowledge of what Yuri did. Five years. And when he walks in that courtroom and sees Yuri, something in him breaks and he rushes towards him. He's yelling and security has to physically restrain him. The judge clearly.

the whole room, he talks to Quay, he tells him there cannot be another outburst like that, or he will be facing criminal contempt. At this point, the defense actually considers requesting a mistrial, and it was Yuri himself that says no, that he wants to continue. So Quay comes back in, apologizes, takes the stand, but is strictly supervised at this point, and testifies that after the shooting, he urged Yuri to go after the gunman, to run after him, do something. And he refused, said he was afraid of being shot. What a coward. I mean, we know none of this is true,

because it was all planned out, and Yuri knew who it was. The defense doesn't call one witness, and they rest. Yuri doesn't testify. And in closing arguments, the prosecution laid everything out that I've already told you. He says it came down to three things, loathing, lusting, and money. Yuri loathed the marriage he was

trapped in. He was out here lusting over other women, and he was motivated by McKeva's money, her business, her home, and her life insurance, the life she built, that he was about to lose access to through the divorce. And then they acknowledged that their witnesses, Demetri and Jovan, they're not perfect. They didn't ask the jury to like them. They asked the jury to look at everything, the cell tower data, the surveillance, the recorded calls. where Yuri tells Dimitri, don't use my name. The jury gets the case, and in less than one hour, they come back.

Guilty, first degree murder. And at sentencing, Gloria, the grandmother who raised McEva, who gave her the foundation for everything she became, stands up and speaks through tears. I'm gonna let you hear that now. I just wanna say to everybody, this has been a long struggle for me, And what has happened to my daughter has affected my life and the life of my family.

I have nothing bad to say about him. All I wanted was justice for my child. And nobody wins in this case. They came to the verdict I wanted them to have, but on neither side was a winner. I know how he has made his family feel, because they had no idea. he could do something like this. I just want everybody to find peace after this. That's it.

Thank you, Miss Hill. Ms. Ellis, is there any else? Yeah. Okay, thank you. Okay, thank you, Ms. Hill. All she wanted was justice for her child, she says. And nobody wins in this case. And she's right.

Nobody wins. Uri is sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. He's taken away in handcuffs, and he's never coming home. Those children lost both of their parents. He had it all, and he wasted it. He's a true loser through and through,

a wolf in sheep's clothing. Javon is sentenced to 15 years in prison, followed by 10 years of probation, and Dimitri, who was found hiding in North Carolina, the U.S. Marshals had to bring him back. he receives 45 days in jail, with 30 already served while he was waiting, and 15 years of probation, 45 days for helping to orchestrate the murder of a pregnant mother of three. Yuri is currently incarcerated at Century Correctional Institution in Florida,

where he will spend the rest of his sorry excuse of a life, and as for prosecutors, they did not pursue the death penalty, and I wanted to tell you why. It came down to strategy. Their entire case rested on two witnesses who had lied repeatedly. Change their stories. And death penalty cases require a very high bar. A life sentence without parole was guaranteed.

So they weren't willing to risk that certainty chasing something more. But he will die in that cell. And that has to be enough. But here's what keeps me up at night about this case. But Kiva Jenkins was not naive. She was not someone who missed things. She had a master's degree. She had a bachelor's in criminal justice.

She ran a successful company. She coached other people through some of the most complicated financial and professional decisions of their lives. This was a sharp woman that was perceptive. She was someone who had spent her whole life being able to read situations and figure out how to navigate them. And she had absolutely no idea that the person closest to her was going to kill her. That's why they say sleep with one eye open. Erie Jenkins was not hiding in the shadows waiting for an opportunity. He was right there in her home, in her bed, at her dinner table, holding her hand in church,

playing a recording of her voice at her funeral while she was dead in her casket. She was sleeping next to the person who wanted her dead. And I think about that a lot. The intimacy of that betrayal. Because most of us lock our door. because we're afraid of what's outside. We check our windows, we set our alarm, we protect ourselves from the world out there.

But what do you do when the danger is already inside? When it's already under the covers next to you, when it already knows your schedule and your habits and the exact time that you fall asleep. You can't protect yourself from that because you don't know you need to. And I need to say this next part. Quay,

Macciva's brother, does not think that this was about life insurance, not at its core. He thinks the money was just part of it, but the real driving force was something much more primal than that. McKeva was leaving. She was growing. She was becoming more and more of who she was meant to be. And Yuri Jenkins, he was losing grip on that, on everything she represented. And his mindset, according to Quay, was simple and terrifying. If he can't have her, then no one could. That's not financial. It's not logical. It's ego.

That's a man who could not tolerate being left by a woman who was always going to be okay without him. The only thing that stopped McEva was the man that she loved. She deserves so much better. And I want to thank you so much for being here for Mackeva's story. I will see you in my very next one. Bye.