OKEMAH - A man charged in the brutal slayings of two young Weleetka girls in 2008 is scheduled to be arraigned Thursday in Okfuskee County court.
Kevin Joe Sweat, 27, will appear in court Thursday so a judge can schedule a date for his first-degree murder trial in the deaths of Skyla Whitaker, 11, and Taylor Paschal-Placker, 13.
Both girls were shot multiple times and left to die on a rural Okfuskee County road in June 2008. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.
At a preliminary hearing in January, a judge ruled to allow into evidence a recorded OSBI interview with Sweat implicating his role in the girls' deaths. On the recording, he tells an investigator that he shot the girls because he thought they were "monsters" coming after him. He also suggested that he might have been possessed or having blackouts.
Sweat told the investigator that while he was in the area to visit family on June 8, 2008, he pulled over to the side of the road to "take a leak," saw the girls coming at him, panicked and shot them with a .40-caliber Glock and a .22.
OSBI agents matched bullet shell casings from the crime scene to casings found on Sweat's shooting range on his father's property, according to court testimony. They also traced ownership of the Glock used in the girls' killings from its import from Austria to when Sweat bought it from a Henryetta police officer.
Investigators have yet to find either gun that was used in the killings, however. The interrogation video took place in September 2011, while Sweat was jailed in connection with the slaying of his former girlfriend, Ashley Taylor, who had disappeared in July of that year.
The couple supposedly were headed to Louisiana to get married, but Ashley Taylor's family never saw or heard from her again after July 15.
Sweat reportedly told investigators that he and Ashley Taylor had an argument around the fall of 2009 during which "the Weleetka girls" incident came up.
At some point, Ashley Taylor made a statement about getting Sweat "in trouble" if he broke up with her, possibly in relation to information Sweat had shared with her regarding the girls' deaths, investigators have said.
Sweat has been ordered to stand trial on a first-degree murder charge in June in connection with Ashley Taylor's death.
Defense attorneys for Sweat have requested a change of venue for the trial, due to intense media coverage of both cases.
Cary Aspinwall 918-581-8477
cary.aspinwall@tulsaworld.com
