Man who shot and killed five women in 2019 inside Sebring bank enters guilty plea

Paul Nutcher, The Ledger
·2 min read
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Zephen Xaver entered a guilty plea to five murder charges Tuesday in Highland County for the 2019 killing of five women in a Sebring bank, a spokesman for the State Attorney’s Office said.

“He pled guilty to all five counts,” said Jacob Orr, assistant state attorney for the 10th Judicial Circuit. “He pled as charged. There was never an offer from the State. The State is pursuing the death penalty.”

Jury selection for the penalty phase is set for January 2024.

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Xaver, who was 21 when the crimes were committed, was indicted by a Highlands County grand jury on five first-degree murder charges against him in the execution-style slaying of the women at the bank on U.S. Highway 27.

He had walked into the bank wearing a bulletproof vest on Jan. 23, 2019 and forced four employees and one customer to lie on the floor, then and killed them, prosecutors said.

This Wednesday, Jan. 23, 2019, booking photo released by the Highlands County Sheriff’s Office shows Zephen Xaver, 21, who was charged with five counts of premeditated murder in the shooting deaths of the four bank employees and a customer in Sebring, Fla. A prosecutor said Friday he will seek the death penalty in the case. (Highlands County Sheriff’s Office via AP)

Investigators said Xaver then called 911 around 12:30 p.m. and told the dispatcher he shot five people and had a 9 mm handgun to his head.

Deputies and officers responded and surrounded the building, with guns drawn. After a two-hour standoff, Highlands County deputies moved in with an armored vehicle and took Xaver into custody.

Officers found all five victims lying face down in the main lobby with gunshot wounds to the back of their heads and upper torsos, The Ledger previously reported. Many spent shell casings were strewn on the floor around them.

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Highlands Sheriff Paul Blackman told the Ledger the killings appeared to be a random act and that there were no indications Xaver intended to rob the bank.

The victims were:

• Debra Cook, 54, of Sebring, a teller, mother of two sons and grandmother.

• Marisol Lopez, 55, a longtime SunTrust teller from Lake Placid and mother of two children.

• Jessica Montague, 31, of Sebring, a teller and mother of three children.

• Cynthia Watson, 65, a bank customer from Venus, an unincorporated area in southern Highlands.

• Ana Pinon Williams, 38, of Sebring, a mother of three children and stepmother of four who had just recently begun working at SunTrust.

Immediately after the shootings, Blackman said investigators had no information on a motives and that the suspect appeared to have no connection with the victims.

State Attorney Brian Haas declined to discuss a motive after the arrest but said information on that would become public as the court proceedings progressed. He had also declined to discuss news media reports, citing sources in Indiana, that Xaver was treated for psychological problems.

Paul Nutcher can be reached at pnutcher@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on The Ledger: Man who killed 5 women in 2019 in a Sebring bank pleads guilty