Fake Lawyer Splits Disabled Daughter’s Head Open + Gets Prison Justice

Fake Lawyer Splits Disabled Daughter’s Head Open + Gets Prison Justice

Kinetta Baron was born on November 13th, 1984, in Hillsborough County, Florida, to parents Booker Ray and Carrie Baron. She remained in the Hillsborough area throughout her childhood. Kinetta grew up in a large family with six other siblings. Everyone who knew her called her Kiki. Growing up, Kiki loved school; she was also very strong in her faith and carried God with her in every part of her life. In her free time, Kiki wrote poetry and loved to cook.

In 2006, when she was 22 years old, Kiki began a relationship with 19-year-old Ronnie O’Neal III. Ronnie was born on July 27th, 1988. During his childhood, he did not have a relationship with his biological father, who reportedly suffered from bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. Ronnie did have a loving stepfather in his life named Billy Smith. Throughout his teen years, Ronnie was active in many extracurricular activities, including football and singing in his church choir. While in school, Ronnie was also part of the ROTC program and had hoped to join the Marines after graduation. Although the academic part of school was a challenge, he successfully graduated from East Bay High School.

After graduation, Ronnie took the entrance exam for the Marines, but he was unable to pass. With his future plans dashed, he ended up working in casinos and driving trucks. He also wrote hip-hop and rap music. In 2008, Ronnie and Kiki welcomed their first child into the world, Rivia O’Neal. Rivia was born premature at just two pounds and two ounces and spent the first part of her life in the NICU on life support. Ronnie later said that he was the person who fought to keep her alive when people around him weren’t sure if she should stay on life support or not. Rivia was later diagnosed with cerebral palsy and would later rely on a wheelchair to get around.

One year after Rivia was born, the couple welcomed their second child, whom they named Ronnie O’Neal IV. We will refer to their son as little Ronnie throughout this episode, as that is how the family distinguished father and son. As time went on, it was clear that Rivia’s struggles did not stop at cerebral palsy; she was later diagnosed with autism and was unable to speak for her entire life. She did communicate using some sign language, which little Ronnie learned so he could communicate with his sister. In addition, family members also remember that Rivia and her little brother seemed to have a very special bond in their own way to communicate with each other.

Kiki loved her children fiercely, and everyone considered her to be an amazing mother. She worked hard to make Rivia’s room look like a home fit for a princess. Kiki often played football with her son and read stories to her daughter as she munched on Oreos and grapes. Rivia started school at Foster Elementary and later attended Core Elementary School. She loved wearing pretty clothes and earrings. She also loved her bus driver, Terry Wallace, as well as her teachers at Core Elementary. She was recognized on a few occasions for her very positive attitude.

It’s unclear when exactly the relationship fell apart, but by 2012, Kiki and Ronnie were separated. That same year, paternity tests were ordered by the court to prove that Ronnie was the father of both children, and he was subsequently ordered to pay child support. In October of 2017, he was found to be delinquent and was ordered to pay Kiki $1,735.32 in back support. At this point, Ronnie was the father of a third child who had been born in 2016 to another woman.

At the time of our story in 2018, Kiki, Rivia, and little Ronnie were living at 13428 Pike Lane Drive in Riverview, Florida, in a three-bedroom rental home owned by Vetus Investment Properties. Kiki was 33 years old and was taking classes at Hillsborough Community College, working hard to build a bright future for her children. However, things were not looking as promising for Ronnie. At this point in our story, he had earned himself a bit of a criminal record; he was convicted of driving without a license, possession, as well as obtaining food or lodging with the intent to defraud.

In addition to that, the police had been called many times by Kiki due to Ronnie abusing her. They fought about money and about Ronnie being present at her home when she did not want him there. They also had regular disputes about him using her car without permission. When she finally called the police regarding this matter, Ronnie retaliated by breaking the front windshield and saying, “If I can’t use the car, no one can.” The deputy categorized this incident as misdemeanor criminal mischief. Kiki accepted the request for prosecution form from police but never ended up submitting it. As we often see in cases such as these, if the victim refuses or is unable to follow up on an incident, the abuser is not charged nor prosecuted.

Over the years, Ronnie left the Christian faith, became a Muslim, and began publicly identifying as a member of the Nation of Islam. In 2017, Ronnie was the victim of a random drive-by shooting and was severely injured. His injuries were so severe that after being rushed to the hospital, his heart stopped several times during surgery. When it was time to be discharged from the hospital, Ronnie was still in pretty rough shape and needed to be living with someone who could assist him while he was healing.

It appears that he was still in a romantic relationship with the mother of his other child at this time, but she refused to let him stay with her. Ronnie’s family also refused. With nowhere else to go, he turned to Kiki for help. Despite her mother being adamant that she should stay away from Ronnie, Kiki agreed to let him stay in her home while he recovered. Ronnie was in her home for about four months when things escalated into a nightmare.

On March 18th, 2018, Ronnie spent the day at his mother’s house changing the brakes on her car. He had little Ronnie with him for the day as well. We can only speculate about what led to such a huge fight between Kiki and Ronnie later that night. Some sources say that the fight was about Ronnie wanting Kiki and their children to convert to Islam, and Kiki standing strong in her Christian faith. Ronnie would later say that Kiki had been fighting with the mother of Ronnie’s other child leading up to this incident, though it’s unclear how that is relevant to what happened next.

What we know is that Ronnie and Kiki’s neighbors called 911.

> “911, what is your emergency?”
> “Yes, my neighbor is beating up his girlfriend next door.”
> “What’s going on there?”
> “I don’t know, I heard the neighbor—help me, help me, help me, help me!”
> “What’s going on, jump up?”
> “I don’t know, I think he’s beating her next door, we just heard some noise next door.”

Kiki made a 911 call at 11:43 p.m. saying that she had been shot. Now, the sequence of events for this incident are a bit jumbled when we compare the 911 call, witness testimonies, and the order that others have listed the events; we’re not 100% sure what order they happened in. What we know is that Kiki sensed that Ronnie was going to get violent and went to hide in a closet—some sources say it was the closet in little Ronnie’s bedroom, and others say it was Rivia’s room. Ronnie discovered where she was and shot through the door, hitting Kiki in her arm. Kiki then ran from the room before Ronnie could shoot again. That is when Kiki called 911.

In the background of the 911 call, a few things can be heard. First, we hear Kiki telling first responders that she’s been shot, but she’s trying to be quiet, so we suspect she was hiding again. First responders try to get her to say her address, but she is unable to—whether that was out of fear or she wasn’t fully aware due to her injuries. You can hear the moment that Ronnie finds her, and she starts screaming, “I’m sorry, Ronnie,” over and over. In the background, we can hear Ronnie saying two things. The first is a repeated chant of *Allahu Akbar*, which is a Muslim saying meaning “God is most great.” We also heard him tell little Ronnie to repeat him, and then a child’s voice can be heard in the background. Ronnie Senior tells little Ronnie to, I quote, “Now get in here and kill this right now.” We want to warn you before we play the recording: the screaming from Kiki that follows that statement is very, very hard to listen to.

> “What’s the address of the emergency, ma’am? What’s the—what’s the address of your em—”
> “Help me please! Me—help me please!”
> “Ma’am, hello? Ma’am, ma’am, hello, hello?”
> “Right now! Come out!”

After the 911 call cuts out, it appears that Kiki ran from the house. Ronnie chased her, and neighbors witnessed Kiki in the yard of the house next door. She was laying on the ground when he shot her again. Then Ronnie held her arm in the air and repeatedly beat her over the head with his shotgun. Now, in some accounts, little Ronnie remembered being forced to hold the shotgun that was pointed at his mother; in others, it seems that his father was asking him to stab his mother. Those details are still unclear.

When one neighbor looked out his front door and saw Kiki being attacked in his yard, he opened the door to intervene. When he did, Ronnie started yelling at him, “You don’t understand,” and then dropped Kiki’s arm and the remains of the shattered shotgun and ran back into his house. Yes, he beat her so badly he broke the gun. The neighbor went into his yard and stayed with Kiki until paramedics arrived. These attacks were also witnessed by a 14-year-old neighbor across the street.

While Ronnie Senior had been out of the house beating Kiki with a shotgun, little Ronnie had attempted to hide. Fortunately, Rivia—though likely aware of the horror and chaos in their house—was unable to hide or plead for her life. So when her father grabbed a hatchet from the garage on his way back in and stormed into her room, there was nothing that she could do. Little Ronnie, hiding in the kitchen, could see into his sister’s room. His father started to hack away at the helpless 9-year-old in the head with a hatchet. The last time little Ronnie saw his sister alive, she had tears streaming down her face; she was being attacked by her father.

After Ronnie murdered his disabled daughter, he left her body on the floor, doused her in gasoline, and lit her on fire. He also dumped gasoline in the closet where he had shot Kiki and lit that on fire as well. After his attempts to cover up his deeds, he then turned and went to find his son. He found little Ronnie hiding in the kitchen and wrenched open a kitchen drawer to grab a knife, spilling knives all over the floor. He then stabbed his son repeatedly in his torso and his neck. He held little Ronnie down with his foot as he dumped gasoline on his body, then lit a tissue on fire and ignited the gasoline.

At some point during this horrific rampage, Ronnie also called 911. In his phone call, he can be heard screaming about demons inside of Kiki and how she had tried to kill him.

> “There’s your emergency!”
> “I just been attacked by some white demon inside and she tried to kill me.”
> “Address?”
> “Huh? What’s the address of the emergency?”
> “She tried to attack you?”
> “Yes, yes, she did! She tried to kill me!”

What he didn’t know was that the police and paramedics were already en route. In fact, they arrived outside to find Kiki while Ronnie Senior was stabbing his son in the kitchen. Initially, the first responders were only looking for one victim, and they found her on the neighbor’s lawn. She was already dead by the time they arrived, laying in the grass with the remnants of the shotgun around her body. It wasn’t until neighbors told them that there were two children in the house that the police and paramedics realized they had a bigger situation on their hands. As they were made aware of this fact, they also looked up at the house and saw the orange glow that indicated a fire in the building.

Due to the training of the police and paramedics, they needed to wait for the fire department to arrive before they could enter the residence to search for the children. However, as they waited, something happened that they didn’t expect. First, Ronnie Senior came out of the garage. He was covered in blood, but the only injury he sustained was a burn on his arm. Police attempted to arrest him peacefully, but Ronnie was ranting and refusing to get on the ground, so he was tased, cuffed, and put in the back of a cruiser. He sat in the cruiser repeating *Allahu Akbar* as first responders continued to try to secure the scene. At one point, he also said, “Kiki is the devil and those are the devil’s kids.”

Firefighters finally arrived and prepared to enter the home, but before they could, little Ronnie came walking out. His clothes were smoking, and he was cut so severely that his intestines were visible. The only words he said before he lost consciousness were, “My father shot my mother.” Little Ronnie was immediately intubated and rushed to Tampa General Hospital. Upon arrival, he was found to have a collapsed lung, exposed intestines, multiple stab wounds, and burns over 25% of his body. Paramedics noted it looked like he had been disemboweled. He also had froth coming from his mouth, which is a sign of smoke inhalation.

Back at the 13428 Pike Lane Drive address, the firefighters were entering the home. The first person to enter the home was Donald Foster in full gear. He dragged the water hose through the door on his hands and knees due to the amount of smoke in the home. As he crawled, he had to feel his way along the walls. A short distance into the home, he saw an orange glow ahead, so he used the hose to spray it quickly. Then he noticed that his hands and knees were slipping on the floor. When he looked down, he realized he was slipping in puddles of blood. He noted that the kitchen floor was littered in knives as though someone had dumped a whole kitchen drawer full of them.

He continued further into the house, sensing another fire and searching for the other child. He noticed lawn equipment inside the house like a gas can; crime scene photos also show a push lawn mower inside of the house. Donald kept going until he came to a wall that was warm to the touch, indicating there was a fire behind it. He opened the door to find a room completely engulfed in flames. Another firefighter took the water hose and began spraying the fire as Donald began feeling his way around the room. He finally found Rivia buried beneath a pile of debris. He was unable to see her, but he pulled her from the debris. He quickly carried her out to the yard and laid her on the ground. It was not until he was clear of the smoke that he realized she was already dead, burned beyond recognition. Later, when asked what he did next, he said he just hugged another firefighter and cried.

Ronnie was taken to the police station to be questioned; however, he lawyered up pretty quickly, so police weren’t able to get much of anything from him at first. In the meantime, his son and namesake was fighting for his life. Miraculously, after a few days and some extensive surgery, little Ronnie woke up. He was able to begin telling the police things he remembered from that night. We would like to remind you that he was still gravely injured and probably on some pretty serious painkillers. As more information came out over the following months, not every detail of little Ronnie’s accounts matched; however, it would be understandable that this 8-year-old boy who had just witnessed the brutal murder of his mother and sister and narrowly survived himself might have mixed up some of the details while he was still near death.

Little Ronnie ended up being in the hospital for over two months. During that time, there was one particular officer, Deputy Blair, who would stop by to visit little Ronnie. When he heard that he was a Tampa Bay Buccaneers fan, Deputy Blair felt compelled to use a connection he had to the team to help cheer up the boy. He began bringing him Buccaneers merch. The two struck up a relationship. Deputy Blair had a wife and five older children. As a father, it must have been absolutely brutal to see this little boy fighting for his life after watching his entire family be annihilated.

One particular night after visiting little Ronnie, Deputy Blair prepared to head out for the evening where he had planned a dinner date with his wife. But as he made to leave, little Ronnie held onto his hand and asked him to stay and watch a movie. Deputy Blair knew immediately that he needed to stay, called his wife, and turned their couples date into a movie night with this amazing little boy. During the time that Deputy Blair spent with little Ronnie throughout his recovery, he crossed paths with his Guardian ad Litem. During one such meeting, Deputy Blair gave the cursory polite response that many people give, something in the ballpark of, “If there’s ever any way I can help, let me know.”

Eventually, little Ronnie was released from the hospital, and the state attempted a few foster care placements with family members. However, for reasons that are unclear, those placements did not work out. One day, Deputy Blair got a call from the Guardian ad Litem desperate. He asked the deputy if he had any leads on a placement for little Ronnie. Luckily, Deputy Blair already had discussed this possibility with his wife; they were already preparing to welcome Ronnie into their home. Ronnie went to stay with Deputy Blair and his family, who instantly welcomed Ronnie and made him a part of their family. It wasn’t long before he was formally adopted by the kindhearted deputy.

After Ronnie Senior’s arrest, he was immediately charged with two counts of first-degree homicide, arson, resisting arrest, and one count of attempted homicide. He was held without bail. He made his first court appearance with his arm wrapped in bandages covering the burn he sustained while lighting his children on fire. In October of 2018, Ronnie was found to be unfit to stand trial. He spent six months in a psychiatric facility and was released back into the criminal justice system. Seemingly stable and unmedicated, he was then re-evaluated and determined fit to stand trial.

He made several requests from prison. The first was that his son, little Ronnie, not be repeatedly interrogated about the case. He claims to be trying to protect him from the psychological damage of repeated interrogations. Let’s just pause for a second and let that piece sink in: he was trying to protect his son from psychological harm after he tried to force his son to kill his own mother, then hacked apart his sister with a hatchet right in front of him, then disemboweled him and lit him on fire! I mean, sure, Ronnie, you’re right, it’s probably very traumatizing for your son to have to retell the horrific crimes he watched you commit. Keep in mind, if Ronnie Senior would have admitted to his crimes and entered a guilty plea, there would be no need to further question his son.

His next request was for a change of venue. He said his rights had been violated by the media coverage making him out to be guilty before he had a fair trial. He claims he was being portrayed as a menace to society and that they were attacking his, as he put it, “good name and known character.” These delays, as well as the pandemic, resulted in the start date of his trial being pushed into June of 2021. In December of 2020, he had officially pled innocent to all of the charges, claiming that he was acting in self-defense.

After three years in custody having prepared for this trial with his public defenders, he decided at the very last minute to represent himself. The judge tried very hard to emphasize that this was not a smart choice for someone facing the death penalty. He had been determined fit to stand trial at this point, but his behavior was still bizarre. At his pre-trial hearing in May of 2021, the judge conducted a *Faretta* inquiry—a series of questions to gauge if a defendant is able to represent himself. Ronnie’s answers were all a little off-kilter, to put it lightly. When asked what his name was, he responded with, “It was Ronnie O’Neal III, but I have a new name only that I know.” And when asked his age, he said, “Hm, that’s a good question. I’m 32 in this world.” He also claimed that Allah had told him not to use a lawyer.

Somehow, his request to represent himself was approved in the State of Florida. However, the judge ordered that his three public defenders would remain with him to help coach him and as a backup if Ronnie changed his mind at any point in the trial. Ronnie’s defense hinged on a few main points: he claimed that Kiki was actually the one who attacked the children and lit the fires. He also intended to prove the government had tampered with the 911 recordings and the video footage taken by a neighbor. At one point, he told the jury, “I guarantee you I wouldn’t waste your time. I would have already taken a plea deal of some kind if I knew I did something like this.”

In Ronnie’s opening statements, we immediately questioned whether he was truly fit to stand trial. Ronnie screamed at the jury and courtroom about the way that the government and police tampered with evidence in this case:

> “Evidence is going to show that we are under some of the most vicious, fabricating, fictitious government you ever seen! By the time it’s all said and done, you will see who is the mass murderers in the Fourth Judicial Circuit of the State of Florida. You will know why what occurred on March 18th, 2018 occurred, and the evidence is going to show that law enforcement tampered with evidence to meet their such high burden of proof… The evidence is going to show my son did not see me murder his mom. The evidence is going to show he did not see me shoot his mom. The evidence is going to show my son said many things that are not true… The evidence is going to show that I called 911 during Kenyetta Baron’s 911 call… I’m standing here competent as can be representing myself today!”

Ronnie continued his disjointed opening statement, claiming witnesses like Khalil Brown and others heard or saw things differently, accusing law enforcement of tampering with audio (like repeating *Allahu Akbar* excessively to make him seem like a terrorist), and claiming the state fabricated evidence. He reiterated his plea of not guilty to premeditated murder, attempted murder, aggravated child abuse, arson, and resisting arrest.

He argued that he acted in self-defense to protect himself and his children from Kenyetta Baron, alleging she had drugs like morphine in her system and a history of domestic violence. After objections from the state and rulings from the judge, Ronnie continued presenting his narrative, questioning the reliability of little Ronnie’s testimony due to trauma, medication, or alleged coaching, and asserting that the entire case was fabricated by a corrupt administration.

Let’s talk about what was found during the autopsies of Kiki and Rivia and the evidence found at the scene.

The autopsy revealed that Kiki’s arm was broken in two places. She had two gunshot wounds: one to her right back shoulder and another, more severe gunshot wound to her elbow. The wounds to her head were extensive; she had over 15 separate lacerations, multiple abrasions and contusions primarily to the left side of her head, six or seven fractures to the head—including a broken jaw and multiple broken facial bones—and severe fractures to the base of her skull. Several of her teeth had been knocked out. Her cause of death was determined to be blunt force trauma to the head.

Rivia’s autopsy also determined that she died from homicidal violence. She had penetrating chop wounds to her head from the hatchet, profound trauma to her neck, and multiple knife wounds—including one to the sole of her foot as though she was curling away or trying to escape as she was attacked. She had broken bones and a severed spinal cord. Her body was also burnt beyond recognition.

In addition to the autopsy reports, forensic investigators gathered a plethora of evidence from the crime scene. There were holes in the closet doors consistent with shotgun projectiles. Inside the closet, they found Kiki’s blood as well as waddings, pellets, three spent casings, live rounds, and a shotgun slug in the closet wall with a scrap of red fabric. Investigators also found a knife with Kiki’s blood on it in the garage. They recovered a knife and a hatchet with Rivia’s blood on it.

One thing that we found fascinating was that a big chunk of his defense was that the evidence the state was using against him was exaggerated. For example, the prosecution asserted that, based on her injuries, Kiki must have been hit in the head with a shotgun 15 times. Ronnie’s response to that was:

“I did not hit her 15 times. I did not hit her. It’s not true. I did not hit her. I did not—it was only three times.”

When the 911 recording showed that he was repeatedly chanting Allahu Akbar, he claimed that the recording had been altered and that he had actually said it only twice, not eight or nine times. We’re not quite sure why he brings up calling Kiki all of those foul names, but he doesn’t end up denying or claiming it was false.

During Ronnie’s trial, the testimonies of the witnesses called by the prosecution were particularly emotional. The biggest concern that many had about Ronnie representing himself was that he would then be the one cross-examining the prosecution’s witnesses. Their primary witness was little Ronnie, who narrowly survived his father’s attack. The choice was made to have little Ronnie join the court through a closed video circuit; he was not in the same room as his biological father.

The thing we found most interesting about the testimony from little Ronnie was the very different demeanor of both little Ronnie and his father compared to other times during court. When little Ronnie was being examined by the prosecution, he spoke with confidence in long, detailed sentences. When his father began to cross-examine him, all of his sentences became short and clipped, and he often seemed confused by his questions. It’s unclear if that is due to Ronnie Senior’s poor phrasing of questions or little Ronnie’s mental state while being questioned by the man who nearly murdered him.

Ronnie Senior also had a very different demeanor compared to his opening and later closing arguments. Instead of yelling as he often did in the courtroom, he questioned little Ronnie in a much quieter and gentler tone. Even his body posture was less confrontational. In his cross-examination, Ronnie Senior focused on trying to discredit statements that little Ronnie had made. He primarily asked him if he remembered various statements made either when he was in the hospital or during some forensic interviews. Little Ronnie sat with his therapy dog and admitted several times that he did not remember making those statements. He was cross-examined for 40 minutes in this manner.

Ronnie Senior took this to mean that the state had tampered with the interviews; however, that’s not what we think. It’s important to remember that at the time of the attack, little Ronnie was only eight years old. He was also nearly killed, witnessed some of the most horrific things a child could ever see, and was initially interviewed just days after the attack while he was likely still heavily medicated. It’s hard to say if those accounts would be more or less accurate than accounts given later. You can imagine that little Ronnie was likely struggling to keep every detail of an extremely horrifying and chaotic night straight. For example, he testified that he remembered his father forcing him to hold the gun and aim it at his mother, but he doesn’t remember if the gun went off or not. One would think that would be vivid in your memory, however, we suspect that little Ronnie’s brain was desperately trying to save him from remembering something so utterly horrific.

Another witness that the jury, media, and courtroom were anxious about was the examination of Deputy Blair, the man who adopted little Ronnie. After Deputy Blair was examined by the prosecution, it was Ronnie’s turn to cross-examine. Everyone in the courtroom held their breath while Ronnie stood and shuffled through papers, appearing to be looking for the questions he wanted to ask. After a minute, he said:

“Thank you from the bottom of my heart to the top of my head. Thank you for what you’ve done. No further questions, Your Honor.”

We’d also like to quickly address a statement made by Ronnie O’Neal during one of his courtroom tirades. At one point, Ronnie screamed that the evidence would show that Kiki had been previously arrested for domestic violence and that she had drugs in her system when she died. Now, we made a note to investigate this further. It’s always important to fully investigate any claims of abuse; in particular, male victims tend to be dismissed or arrested themselves when they report domestic violence. However, other than that one statement, we were unable to find a single other reference referring to those two facts. If Kiki was using drugs, we would have expected to see that in her autopsy report, but it wasn’t there.

At the conclusion of his trial, Ronnie Senior’s closing arguments were just about as unhinged as his opening statements:

“Mr. O’Neal, you need to speak audibly so that the jury can hear what you’re saying.”
“Yes, ma’am. I haven’t begun yet.”

“Talking to my father, he showed you a fraudulent recording where they alleged that I beat Kinetta Baron to death. He talked about Mr. Khalil Brown, my neighbor who stayed across the street. But if Mr. Khalil Brown was a help to them proving me guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, they would have called Mr. Khalil Brown. But I called Mr. Khalil Brown to be a witness for me, and I didn’t ask him to lie about one thing that he saw that night. I asked him to tell the jury exactly what he saw that night. And you have to ask yourself why that is, because he’s playing a fraudulent damn recording of me beating Kenyetta Baron 15 damn times when that did not happen. And like I told you earlier, you will know the truth, whether in this trial or the next one, better believe it. If you think I’m here to play around with y’all, goddamn it, I’m not.”
“All right, Mr. O’Neal, please stop using swearing language. It’s not appropriate in a closing argument.”
“Now, he played a recording that was sped up. Why didn’t you play the regular recording that people can understand what the call was saying?”
“Objection to the defendant asking me questions, Your Honor.”
“I’m going to sustain—I’m talking to people, Mr. O’Neal. Listen, please just keep in mind this is not personal towards the prosecutors. Please keep your comments directed towards the evidence and the law.”
“Thank you. I know for a fact Kiki’s recording from her father did not record calls sped up like that.”
“I’m going to object now, he’s talking about facts not in evidence so what he knows—”
“Again, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, as you were instructed, the closing arguments are just that: they’re not the evidence or the instruction on the law. It’s just what the parties believe the evidence shows or does not show. All right, thank you.”

“You heard Mr. Khalil Brown. You’ve been hearing me for two weeks now telling you that they committed criminal acts against me with the 911 calls and that fraudulent video that they just showed y’all. Now, I’m going to prove it to you. You heard Khalil Brown: he said that he was actually sure that I only hit Kinetta Baron three times. You heard I called him to tell you that I ain’t running from nothing. They didn’t call Khalil Brown to tell you that I did, and you have to ask yourself why that is, because I want you to know the actual facts. I did kill Kiki, but I want you to tell it like it is if you’re going to tell it.”

Ultimately, the jury only deliberated for three hours before finding Ronnie O’Neal guilty on all charges. They were unable to come to a unanimous decision on the death penalty; therefore, Ronnie was not eligible to be put to death.

During Ronnie’s sentencing hearing, Judge Michelle Cisco was emotional and close to tears at points. We do not want to water down how powerful her statements were, so we will highlight them here:

“There’s a part of you that can be very charming and very likable, and with all due deference to your counsel—they’re all excellent lawyers, excellent lawyers—but I have to tell you, I think that your representation of yourself also aided in saving you from the death penalty. I really do. I really think that—oh, I could be wrong, but that’s just my best guess. However—well, you’re welcome, Mr. O’Neal, I’m just telling you the truth as I see it. However, 19 years I’ve been at this job, I’ve seen human beings killed at the hands of others in every way imaginable. You name it, I’ve seen shootings, stabbings, drownings, suffocating, blown apart by a car, some DUI manslaughter cases, horrible things. This is the worst case I have ever seen as far as the facts go.”

“When the person from the fire department testified, and when he said that he retrieved the body of Rivia O’Neal from the home and all he could do was sob—it took every ounce I had not to start sobbing too, because there is no way any person with any feeling could have witnessed or seen the photos of what occurred that night and not be haunted for the rest of your life. I know I will be for the rest of my life. I’ll be haunted by what I saw as far as the evidence and just the abject cruelty of it all. Abject cruelty.”

“And I, you know, I was aware because I reviewed a lot of the discovery ahead of time as you well know, did a lot of in camera inspection of a lot of documents, and I was aware there was some evidence at least that when you needed to recover from your gunshot wound that neither your parents nor your ex, Aisha Miss Robinson, would let you come recover at their home. I don’t know if it’s true or not, I’m just—okay, I’m not going to get into a dispute, I’m just—I’m just mentioning there was some evidence referencing that in the record. And all I could think about, because I know—I knew that Miss Baron was not with you romantically at the time and I knew that she just out of the goodness of her heart let you come stay with her, and it is beyond tragic that that critical decision ended in so much horror for her and for her children. It is unspeakably cruel what happened as a result of that one decision.”

“The way that Miss Baron died was horrific. In that 911 call, which captured truly all of it—you heard, and everyone has heard that 911 call—heard a death scream. If anybody ever wants to know what it sounds like before a human being dies knowing that their death is imminent, that’s exactly what it is. That was a death scream.”

“And what happened to little Rivia and to little Ronnie—but I’m going to focus on Rivia, because she was special, and you could tell Miss Baron had done everything she could to create a beautiful home for her family. I noticed that Rivia’s bedroom, before you set it on fire, you could tell she tried so hard to make her feel like a princess. Kenyetta did everything she could. And I noticed too, in the kitchen on the refrigerator, she put up magnets that said ‘Faith, Love, Family, Hope.’ And then you know what else happened at the refrigerator during that night? It got splattered with blood all over it due to what happened.”

“Little Rivia, she couldn’t scream, she couldn’t run away, and she witnessed what you did to her mother as far as shooting her mother in the arm with the gunshot. She knew the horror that that child suffered, and she already had a life where she was born with challenges regarding her physical and her mental disabilities. But the pain and suffering that she suffered that night at your hands—unspeakable, absolutely unspeakable. And at the moment that first time you struck her with that hatchet—and little Ronnie testified that all he could see was tears coming out of his sister’s face—at that moment, that child knew. She knew she was being betrayed in the cruelest, most tragic, and sorrowful way that a child could ever be betrayed. She was being betrayed by her parent, the one person that should be there to protect their children and love them and keep them from harm. And that was the last thing that child felt before she passed on from this Earth: was your utter cruel betrayal to her.”

“And I read somewhere—and I don’t know if it’s true or not, I have no idea—but I read somewhere that souls pick their lives and that they know exactly how difficult their lives are going to be before they enter into this world. And I don’t know if that’s true or not, but if it is, Rivia O’Neal is one of the bravest souls I have ever come across in my 54 years on this planet. One of the bravest, ever, ever, because she suffered so traumatically.”

During the sentencing hearing, various members of Kiki and Rivia’s family took the stand to give their impact statements. The first to take the stand was Kiki’s 11-year-old niece, Ariana Crumb. She had requested to be the first person to speak to the man who killed her aunt and cousin. She sat bravely in the witness stand next to the judge and looked out over the courtroom into the face of Ronnie O’Neal. She told him about what he had taken from her and said, “A part of my heart is missing.”

Kiki’s younger sister, Deda, also spoke to Ronnie, hoping that he is haunted by the sound of Kiki’s screams from that 911 call for the rest of his life. Kiki’s mother, Carrie, also spoke, saying:

“My family is my life, I breathe for my family, so now you’ve got me gasping for air because you took my children from me.”

There’s one more thing we want to address about Ronnie’s defense. An appeal was filed on his behalf after he was found guilty by the State of Florida. The appeal sought to have him retried under the assumption that he was in fact insane at the time of the murder. They attempted to prove this with a report by one Dr. McLean. Her report claimed that Ronnie had suffered sexual abuse as a child, giving him PTSD. This, in combination with the shooting several months prior to the incident, put him in a place of compromised mental health. Her assertion was that it was very possible for someone with PTSD to be suffering from an extreme trauma response during a stressful situation. She referenced how people with PTSD often have debilitating flashbacks, extreme fight-or-flight responses, aggression, trouble feeling positive emotions, etc.

And while all of those things are true, there was a major hole in this argument: Dr. McLean never actually interviewed or evaluated Ronnie. She never reviewed any of the six previous mental health evaluations made by other doctors. She did not know if he had nightmares, flashbacks, or any other physical trauma responses. In this appeal, Ronnie also brought up the argument again that Kiki had killed Rivia and that he was acting out of pure instinct and passion. Ronnie’s appeal was denied. Ronnie will remain in prison until he dies; with Ronnie’s three life sentences as well as an additional six years, he will never again be a free man.

We found one secondhand account from another inmate serving time in the Liberty Correctional Institution in Bristol, Florida. According to this inmate, Ronnie is not serving a cushy sentence. One consistent thing we hear is that many other inmates do not have respect for people who kill women and children, so being in prison with this piece of shit, Rodney [Ronnie] O’Neal… In case you’re not familiar with who this piece of shit is: he is convicted of killing his wife, his daughter who was nine at the time, and attempted murder on his son who was only eight years old at the time. He was representing himself and cross-examined his own son and made him relive the day that he murdered his sister, his mother, and his own father tried to murder him. He ultimately gets sentenced to life in prison. Life in prison in Florida means life in prison; they don’t have parole, they don’t have a minimum or maximum, you’re doing life. The only way you’re getting out of there is in a pine box.

So, talking to Spawn—if you guys aren’t familiar with who Spawn is, he’s like my little brother; he went to prison for three years, ended up almost getting 30 after someone tried to sexually assault him and he stabbed him viciously (go check out the video, one of the most horrific things that I’ve seen in prison)—Spawn is currently in Liberty CI Correctional Institution with Ronnie O’Neal. And when we were talking the other day on the phone, I asked him, “What’s it like living with him?”

So, he’s hated by everyone. Spawn told me that it doesn’t matter the race, the religion; every organization is trying to get him, kill him. Like, he can’t even get out for five minutes without being assaulted. He’s telling me that the staff over there is poisoning his food. I mean, he is going through hell. They said he got into a fight with somebody that was trying to extort him and basically take everything from him, and he got beat so bad with a lock in a sock that they had to airlift him to a hospital. See, everybody’s this tough guy killer guy until they go to prison with the real killers, the real gangsters. And now they say he’s scared to death; he’s scared to eat food, he’s scared to even walk to the showers by himself.

I asked Spawn if he had any like problems with him, and he told me like this, he said:

“They’re all in CM.”

You know, basically it’s close management where you have property restriction, you know, you’re only allowed out at this certain amount of time, and he happened to be in the dog cage, which is like this tiny welded cage with him. And they say he had a bounty on his head. It’s on-site: basically, you killed a kid, you tried to kill another kid, and you killed a woman at the same time, and then you try to torture your own son into reliving those moments. So they put a bounty on his head because he was claiming some organization, and that organization was like, “Yo, he is no good with us, the fact that he’s even saying that.”

So Spawn tried to collect on that organization, on the bounty that that organization put out, because you’re representing a serious group of people and you did this heinous—oh, no, you’re getting excised out immediately. So, you know, we’re talking on the phone and I said, “So basically what happened?” He said:

“All I know is he tripped on a banana peel, walked up with blood all over his face. They shut down the little dog cage yards we were on. I went back to my cell and had $100 worth of canteen.”

Just know, for everybody affected by this case, or everyone who has kids and just can’t stand people who do this shit, every single day he is living in hell. Leave our kids alone, stay out, stay free.

A funeral was held for Kiki and Rivia on April 7th, 2018. Their service was held at the Greater New Salem Primitive Baptist Church in Tampa, Florida. They are buried together at the Rest Haven Memorial Park.

In closing, we’d like to talk once again about the beautiful people who were attacked in this story. Rivia was the love of her mother’s life. She was deeply loved by her mother, brother, teachers, peers, and everyone else who met her. Kiki was such an amazing mother; in person and on her social media presence—which was almost all positive affirmations—she was truly a ray of hope and positivity in the world. She was working so hard to provide for her children; she had returned to school and still found time to cook her kids’ favorite foods, play with them in the yard, and spruce up their bedrooms. According to her son, little Ronnie, she was just a good mom:

“We did like a lot of things together. She was nice, pushed me on the swing, made me some good wings.”