Hope Mills Man Faces Death Penalty in Gruesome Slaying With Girlfriend

A Cumberland County jury is bracing to hear gruesome details about the slaying and dismemberment of Rebecca Michelle Fellows, who prosecutors said was murdered by a couple that lured her into participating in their rape-murder fantasy.

The murder trial of Miguel Angel Navarro of Pageant Court in Hope Mills began Monday following more than three weeks of jury selection. His then-girlfriend, Beverly Ann Harris of Hoke County, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and other charges in June 2023, The Fayetteville Observer reported. The plea deal calls for Harris to testify against Navarro and assist in his prosecution. She will serve between 18 and 29 years, one of Navarro’s lawyers said on Monday.

Prosecutors are seeking the death sentence for Navarro. They said he injected Fellows with poison after he was unable to kill her by strangulation with a wire around her neck. Fellows was 40 when she disappeared in July 2020. Her skeletal remains were found two months later in Johnston County.

Navarro has said he did not kill Fellows, but admits helping his girlfriend Harris dispose of the body, Navarro’s lawyer Harold Pope told the jury in opening statements.

“He will deny raping anybody, and he will deny killing anybody,” Pope said.

“Beverly Harris pled guilty to murder because Beverly Harris is the real killer,” he said, and it’s in her self-interest to pin the slaying on Navarro.

“She said her fantasy was: She wanted to pick up a ‘useless hooker,’ somebody no one cares about, bring em back, rape them, murder them. That’s what Beverly Harris said,” Pope told the jurors.

If jurors find Navarro guilty of first-degree murder, they will also decide if he receives the death penalty or life without parole.

‘They Both Were Wrong’

Assistant District Attorney Kayley Taber laid out a sordid story to the jurors in her opening statement. Pope also described some of the events, but minimized Navarro’s involvement.

Navarro was married to a traveling nurse who frequently worked out of town for several days at a time, Taber said. They had a “lovely little house on a cul-de-sac,” she said.

“He also shared that home with his lover, Beverly Harris,” Taber said. “Both women thought they were in an exclusive loving relationship with Miguel. They were both wrong.”

Navarro’s wife provided security and paid the bills “while Miguel tried to figure out what he was doing next,” Taber said. Harris gave Navarro the ability to live out his “darkest fantasies,” she said.

Harris, meanwhile, did not know that Navarro had a wife, Pope said. She told an investigator, “He’s not married. They’re roommates,” he said.

Harris shared sex fantasies from her experience as a phone-sex operator with Navarro in Snapchat messages, Taber said.

She also messaged Navarro that she wanted to abduct and rape “some useless hooker,” Taber said.

“Well that’s not bad, babe,” Taber said Navarro replied.

Later in the conversation, Navarro messaged that he would do whatever Harris wanted to the women, Taber said.

Pope offered statements Harris made to an agent with the State Bureau of Investigation.

“She liked rough sex and her fantasy was, she told the agent, was to go out and pick up somebody, bring them back into the house, and watch Miguel have sex with that woman like he does with her,” he said.

Who Is the Killer?

Navarro and Harris first drove around in search of a sex worker, Pope said. They returned to Navarro’s house when they couldn’t find someone. Harris then connected with Fellows on Skip the Games, which is a website for finding escorts.

They offered Fellows $200, Pope and Taber said. Navarro picked Fellows up from Manna Church on Legion Road and took her to his home on Pageant Court.

The accounts of what happened next differ.

“When he got Rebecca in the house, they began,” Taber said. “He choked, he beat, he raped Rebecca while Beverly watched.”

Fellows fought back, Taber said, and hit him in the head with a large wrench.

Navarro tried to strangle Fellows with the wire, Taber said. When that failed, Navarro injected poison into her ear with a syringe, and that killed her, she said.

The couple amputated Fellows’ hands and feet, Taber said. They dumped her body in Johnston County and her hands and feet in several places, she said.

After Fellows did not return to the Fayetteville home she was staying in, Taber said family members tracked her cell phone’s location to Navarro’s home and involved law enforcement. Fellows had three daughters.

Harris and Navarro discussed in Snapchat messages their efforts to cover up the crime, Taber said.

More than two months later, on September 23, 2020, Harris led police to Fellows’ body, she said.

But Pope told the jury that Navarro did not kill Fellows.

Harris at first denied involvement with Fellows’ disappearance, Pope said. Only after police searched her home and property in Hoke County did she confess. Jurors should consider that Harris made a living fabricating stories when she was a phone sex operator, he said.

Navarro admitted going to an ATM to get cash from Harris’ account to pay Fellows, Pope said. He also admitted picking her up from the church and taking her to his house, his attorney said.

“That’s where things go wrong,” Pope said. “Miguel’s thinking the fantasy is to just have sex.”

But instead, Pope said, Harris “goes berserk.”

At some point, Navarro left, Pope said. Later “he comes back, and Beverly Harris has managed to remove this lady’s feet and hands.”

Navarro used his car to help Harris dispose of the body, Pope said.

The trial continues Tuesday at the Cumberland County Courthouse.

Senior reporter Paul Woolverton can be reached at pwoolverton@cityviewnc.com.

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