An accomplice to murder or just a scheming husband’s pawn?

Exactly two years to the day since Thomas and Jackie Hawks were last seen alive, a woman accused of helping in their alleged murders at sea was portrayed alternately Wednesday as a calculated accomplice motivated by greed, and an unwitting pawn manipulated by her diabolical husband.

The contrasting depictions of Jennifer L. Deleon were presented during closing arguments at her Santa Ana trial over the Nov. 15, 2004, disappearance of the Hawkses, who allegedly were tied together to an anchor and tossed overboard after being tricked into a test-sail of their 55-foot yacht, Well Deserved.

Orange County Deputy Dist. Atty. Matt Murphy asked a jury to convict Deleon, arguing that even though she was not on board when the Hawkses were killed, she aided in the plot by using her 9-month-old daughter to gain the couple’s trust a week before the murders. For that act alone, he said, pointing to Deleon in court, “that woman needs to be held responsible.”

Defense attorney Michael Molfetta, on the other hand, cast her husband, Skylar Deleon, as the bad guy. He reminded jurors that the case against Jennifer was built solely on circumstantial evidence; Skylar Deleon, he said, was the common denominator in every element of the alleged crime, leaving his wife out of the loop with an assortment of lies.

“There is no smoking gun,” Molfetta said. “There is nothing. Zippo. This case boils down to one thing: Skylar.”

Molfetta will wrap up his closing argument today in the case against Jennifer Deleon, a 25-year-old mother of two who is being prosecuted on two counts of murder and the special-circumstance allegation of murder for financial gain. If convicted, she could face life in prison without parole. Skylar Deleon, 27, goes on trial in January.

Jennifer Deleon’s husband, along with Alonso Machain and John Fitzgerald Kennedy, allegedly forced the Hawkses to sign transfer-of-title and power-of-attorney documents, handcuffed them to an anchor and tossed them into the sea off Newport Beach.

A central question in the trial is the extent to which she knew about and participated in any plot. Prosecutors allege that she was a party to it, helped destroy evidence and lied to investigators to cover it up.

The defense maintains that she didn’t know what her husband was up to until after the couple was killed, then followed his lead out of fear of what he might do to her.

During closing arguments, both sides spent a good deal of time addressing a phone call Skylar Deleon placed to his wife Nov. 6, 2004, requesting that she come down to Newport Beach with their 9-month-old daughter to meet the Hawkses and “put them at ease.”

Earlier that day the couple was supposed to have been killed during a test sail of the yacht, according to testimony by Machain, who is also charged in the case. But for some reason, Machain said, Skylar Deleon changed his mind and persuaded Jennifer to meet with the Hawkses aboard the Well-Deserved.

Murphy cited the event as a pivotal moment in the run-up to the murders. It was at this point, he told jurors, that she decided to take part in the plan. At the time, he added, Jennifer Deleon knew that she and her husband were broke and, based on his criminal history, that he was willing to use deadly force to enrich them both.

The case is expected to go to the jury today after Molfetta finishes his closing arguments.

christine.hanley@latimes.com