A woman sentenced to die by a Mobile County jury will be headed back to court later this month after her sentence was overturned.
Heather Leavell-Keaton, the first woman in Mobile County history to be sent to death row, will face a hearing Oct. 13 in Mobile County Circuit Court where she will be resentenced for her 2015 capital murder conviction.
Leavell-Keaton, along with her common-law husband John DeBlase, were convicted of torturing and killing his two children, four-year-old Natalie and three-year-old Chase, in 2010.
The Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals Tuesday ruled that Leavell-Keaton did not have a chance to address the court prior to her sentencing back in 2015. Leavell-Keaton displayed no emotion during her sentencing, according to a report at the time.
“To be clear, the trial court is not to hold a full capital-conviction sentencing hearing, which has already occurred,” the court ruled. Instead, the court will allow her to speak, take into consideration anything she may say, and sentence her to either death or life imprisonment without the possibility of parole, the court ruled.
According to prosecutors, Natalie was choked to death in March 2010 after being duct-taped and placed in a suitcase which was set in a closet for 12 hours. Her body was later dumped in a wooded area near Citronelle. Chase was choked to death in June 2010 when he was taped to a broom handle and left in the corner of the couple’s bedroom overnight. His body was found in the woods outside Vancleave, Miss. Prosecutors claimed that Leavell-Keaton was jealous of Natalie and bristled when friends and family members called her a princess. Chase was killed when he asked where Natalie was.
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