Cops in St. Paul, Minnesota, investigate the homicide that killed 19-year-old Jay'Mier K. Givens (KSTP/YouTube).
A 17-year-old from Minnesota who teamed up with another juvenile to fatally stab a 19-year-old 22 times, mostly in the back before one of them wrote about the brutal attack in his journal is headed to prison.
Jeremy Joe Davila pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in the death of Jay'Mier K. Givens. He was sentenced Friday to 25 1/2 years behind bars, receiving credit for the roughly eight months he already served. A 14-year-old boy who has not been identified because of his age also was charged with second-degree murder.
Officers with the St. Paul Police Department responded at around 11:30 p.m. March 31, 2025, to a call of an unresponsive male lying on the street. Paramedics arrived and rushed Givens to the hospital, where doctors pronounced him dead.
At sentencing, Givens' family addressed Davila.
"I thought that he was your homey, bro," the victim's uncle DeWayne Givens said, according to a courtroom report from The Pioneer Press.
Davila reportedly held his head down for most of the hearing and only said "may he rest in peace" when a judge asked him if he wanted to say anything.
The victim's mother spoke about the difficulty she had after giving birth to him when she was 14 years old. Waynesha Givens held her son's graduation hat and high school diploma, which he earned just four months before his death.
"It was not easy getting there, but we did it," she recalled.
Waynesha Givens said it was "horrible to me" that her son had such a short life, but her son will always be with her.
"I feel it in my heart. And he made me who I am today," she said, per the Press.
As Law&Crime previously reported, an autopsy revealed Jay'Mier Givens suffered 22 stab wounds: 18 to the back, two to the upper left arm and one each to the neck and right hand, a probable cause arrest affidavit said.
Givens' brother told investigators Givens went "to smoke" with his buddies Davila and the 14-year-old whom police identified in the affidavit as JC. The suspects, who are foster brothers, lived about three blocks from where Givens was found. Detectives were able to map out the victim's movements from the GPS on his phone, and it showed he was near the suspects' home around the time of the slaying, the affidavit said. Surveillance video also captured three people entering a wooded area but only two running away.
A neighbor said the occupants of the suspects' house "displayed unusual behavior" in the hours after the homicide, including covering all windows with blankets or curtains, cops noted. Investigators obtained a search warrant for the house on April 8 and ultimately recovered two knives hidden inside the basement rafters, the affidavit said. They also found clothes that matched those of the two suspects captured on the surveillance video, per officers.
Officers arrested JC on May 1 at his temporary foster home. The parents at the home told cops JC seemed anxious in recent days so they gave him a notebook to write down his thoughts. Several pages apparently referenced the homicide.
JC allegedly wrote that "we dropped one" and the victim was "poked in the back" and that "now we are havin hella fun."
"He tried ta scream. He tried ta run but he aint fight," the teen also wrote, according to the affidavit. "Why you aint fight for yo life when I poke u wit dis knife."
While at first denying involvement, JC admitted to stabbing Givens, per the affidavit. He allegedly admitted to chasing him down and attacking him. He said he was beefing with the victim because he was "dissing" his girlfriend's child, cops wrote.
JC said he and Davila lured Givens out by telling him they were in a stolen car because they knew that would "interest him."
"That was a cover-up," JC reportedly said. "There was no car."
After the homicide, he and Davila went back to their home, washed the knives, and hid them in the basement rafters.
Authorities declined to reveal the fate of the 14-year-old due to privacy laws.
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