TAMPA, Fla. (Court TV) — A man who killed his girlfriend and their unborn child three days after he was acquitted in a different double homicide wrote to the judge asking to be sentenced to death at his next hearing.
Billy Adams III (Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office)
Billy Adams III, 28, was convicted of first-degree murder and killing an unborn child by injury to the mother in the shooting death of Alana Sims, 22, whose body was found Jan. 23, 2023. At the time of her death, Sims was five months pregnant with Adams’ child.
The same jury that convicted Adams recommended he be sentenced to life without parole for Sims’ death and that he receive the death penalty for the death of the unborn child. Under Florida law, after a jury makes a recommendation of death, a judge holds a Spencer hearing to consider additional mitigating evidence from the defense before sentencing.
Adams has asked his attorneys to present no further mitigation at his Spencer hearing in December. In a handwritten letter filed with the court, Adams wrote:
[W]hen we go to court on December 1st, I want to be sentenced to what the jury already recommended during the penalty phase of the trial. I have already discussed everything with my lawyers and I told them I don’t want any more mitigation or arguments being presented. I want to waive mitigation at this hearing and I want to be sentenced to what the jury voted to give me. … It is my decision to waive mitigation at this hearing and I’m writing to put this on the record.
Adams further wrote, “I don’t have an issue with the death penalty, and have asked my lawyers to respect my wishes when we go to court.”
This photo provided by Shahlevi Sims shows 22-year-old Alana Sims. (Shahlevi Sims via WFTS)
This is not Adams’ first time writing to the court. Shortly after his arrest in 2023, Adams handwrote a motion seeking a competency hearing.
Prosecutors said messages on Adams’ phone showed a motive: In the days before Sims’ death, he texted another woman that he wanted a relationship with her. The day before she was killed, Adams wrote to the woman, “Tomorrow this s— done,” and “I meant wat I said. We finna have out life …. An it don’t include ha a—.”
Prosecutors have not responded to Adams’ filing. The Spencer hearing is scheduled for Dec. 1.
At the time of Sims’ death, Adams, who was a rapper in Tampa at the time, had been acquitted three days earlier of charges that he murdered two men found dead in a recording studio; in that case, Adams successfully claimed he acted in self-defense.
