Sean Gathright took the stand in Tampa and asked a jury not to recommend death.

On May 8, 2026, that same Hillsborough County jury convicted him and three other Jacksonville men of first-degree murder in the June 23, 2024 killing of Charles “Julio Foolio” Jones Jr. The only sentences left under Florida law are life without parole or death. Florida lets a jury send a man to death on an 8-4 vote.

Gathright was 20. Prosecutors said he was one of three gunmen who hit Foolio’s Dodge Charger outside a hotel by the University of South Florida. They said the four drove down from Jacksonville as part of a long gang war. Foolio was 26. He was a face of that city’s drill scene. Three other people in or around the car were also shot. The extra counts were conspiracy and attempted second-degree murder.

In the penalty phase Gathright did not fight the verdict. “I’m not here to dispute anything,” he said. “I’m here to be a man and take responsibility.” Then the line on the graphic: “I feel very remorseful. This is a terrible situation. It’s been a traumatic experience.”

He told Foolio’s family he understood what it is to lose a child, a brother, a cousin. “I just cannot say sorry enough.” He said he grew up in church, read the Bible cover to cover in jail, and that God can use for good what the devil meant for bad.

His sister testified first. She talked about their childhood and said she missed her brother. Gathright cried.

Cross-examination was the other half of the day. Assistant State Attorney Scott Harmon would not leave the night of the shooting. He asked if Gathright felt remorse while the AR-15 was still warm. If he felt it running back to the Impala. Gathright said he tries not to remember that night and that he focuses on today. Harmon asked whether the remorse started after the guilty verdict. The judge cut some of the questions. The point was already in the room: sorry now is not the same as sorry then.

Gathright is the youngest of the four. Coverage noted the state did not brand him a gang member the way it did the others. That is mitigation language. It is not innocence. The jury already found he helped kill Foolio.

The decision in front of them is simple and ugly. Life in a cell, or death. Gathright’s play was faith, youth, and the word remorseful. The state’s play was the rifle, the hotel parking lot, and a rapper who never got out of the car.