Death Penalty News

When Gov. Ron DeSantis was seeking the Republican presidential nomination last year, he ratcheted up the pace of executions, overseeing six – the most in Florida in almost a decade.  But by the time DeSantis’ presidential bid ended in January, his fervor for executions had abated, continuing into a layoff that is now prompting questions about just what powered last year’s surge. 

New measure comes after Parkland gunman Nikolas Cruz sentenced to life in prison Florida will soon no longer require unanimous jury recommendations for judges to impose death penalty sentences under a bill the Legislature approved Thursday, a reaction to the life sentence handed to the man who massacred 17 people at a Parkland high school. The House passed the bill on an 80-30 vote. It now goes to Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis for final approval. It will allow the death penalty with a jury recommendation of at least 8-4 in favor of execution. DeSantis supports the proposal. The bill was filed after the outrage over a divided 9-3 jury sparing Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooter Nikolas Cruz from capital punishment for the 2018 massacre. He instead received a life sentence with no parole.

Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) called for an “automatic death penalty” for school shooters after a 28-year-old killed three children and three adults at a Christian elementary school in Nashville, Tenn.  “We need to consider an automatic death penalty for school shooters,” Scott posted to Twitter. “Life in prison is not enough for the deranged monsters who go into our schools to kill innocent kids & educators.” “Pray for all facing the unimaginable in Nashville. This is horrible & must stop,” he added. A shooter who police say surveilled The Covenant School and drew maps of the building in advance of the massacre blasted through the school’s locked glass doors on Monday, killing three nine-year-olds and three adults in their 60s. 

A judge sentenced William Van Poyck to die for the 1987 murder of a Glades prison guard. He was executed decades later. Jane Musgrave covered the execution of William Van Poyck in 2013 for The Palm Beach Post. I remember a black hearse that looked like something out of a 1940s gangster movie driving along a fog-shrouded field at dusk, carrying William Van Poyck’s body from Florida State Prison. I remember hearing his sister calling after it. “ 'Oh Billy, Billy!'" she cried. "'He's finally free. He's outside those prison walls.'" I remember hearing a group of nuns and other death penalty opponents chanting and praying. Across the muddy field outside the sprawling prison, family members of the man Van Poyck murdered celebrated. After waiting nearly three decades for the 58-year-old Van Poyck to be killed for murdering prison guard Fred Griffis in a botched attempt to free a Glades Correctional Institution inmate, family members said they finally had...

SARASOTA, Fla. (WWSB) - Death penalty opponents are calling on Gov. Ron DeSantis to stop the execution of serial killer on death row. Bobby Joe Long is scheduled to be executed Thursday at Florida State Prison for the 1984 murder of Michelle Simms in Hillsborough County. In 1985, Long pleaded guilty to seven additional first-degree murder charges and numerous charges for sexual batteries and kidnappings in the Tampa Bay Area. Long’s attorney has filed appeals to try to block the execution, a process that likely will continue leading up to Thursday. If given a lethal injection, he would be the first death row inmate executed since Gov. DeSantis took office in January. Death penalty opponents want DeSantis to stop the execution, saying capital punishment is not a deterrent to crime. “Once you cross a threshold, it can be tough to go back from," Michael Sheedy of the Florida Conference of Catholic Bishops. "We believe that he does recognize the really ...

TALLAHASSEE — Serial killer Bobby Joe Long is scheduled to be executed at 6 p.m. Thursday at Florida State Prison in the 1984 murder of Michelle Simms in Hillsborough County. Long would be the first Death Row inmate executed since Gov. Ron DeSantis took office in January.  But Florida has a long history of executions after the death penalty was reinstated in 1976, following a four-year hiatus stemming from a U.S. Supreme Court ruling. Here is a by-the-numbers look at the death penalty in Florida, according to information from the state Department of Corrections: 1924: The year Frank Johnson became the first inmate executed in the state’s electric chair. A 2000 law allowed the use of lethal injection. 2: The number of prisons where men on Death Row are housed. They are Florida State Prison and Union Correctional Institution. 1: The number of prisons where women on Death Row are housed. They are held at Lowell Annex. 97: Number of executions since the death penal...

Gillum's stance under question by Orange County family The family of a murdered Orange County teen said they want to know more details about Democratic gubernatorial candidate Andrew Gillum's stance on the death penalty. Gillum told WFOR-TV in August that he wants to temporarily suspend the death penalty in Florida if he's elected governor. "Until we can come up some answers as to why it is that there seems to be in this state the racial bias when it comes to the application on the death penalty," he told the station. "These are heinous crimes," Rafael Zaldivar said in response. Zaldivar's 19-year-old son Alex was shot and killed in Orange County in 2012 by Bessman Okafor. Okafor is now being resentenced after a Supreme Court decision requiring all death penalty cases to have a unanimous jury verdict. Zaldivar said he doesn't want that possibility taken away. "That's going to be a problem with not only ...

Scott gives Orange/Osceola State Attorney Aramis Ayala's office until Dec. 11 to provide answers about seeking the death penalty in the Emerita Mapp case. Gov. Rick Scott's office demanded that Orange/Osceola State Attorney Aramis Ayala provide a series of answers about the pursuit of the death penalty in a case involving an April murder in Kissimmee. In a Monday letter, Scott's general counsel said Ayala failed to "file a timely notice of intent" to seek the death penalty against Emerita Mapp, who had been charged with 1st-degree murder in the stabbing death of Zackery Ganoe. The Orlando Sentinel reported that a notice to seek the death penalty was filed by Ayala's office in October after a panel of seven attorneys in her office recommended the death penalty. Ayala's decision to form the panel came after the Florida Supreme Court ruled that Ayala was wrong in refusing to pursue the death penalty. After the verdict, Ayala said she would ...

The parents of a young woman who was killed chose to forgive his killer, and they want to stop executions in Florida. Even before the Seminole Heights case, the debate over the death penalty has been an ongoing one in Florida for quite some time. The last day of November marks the annual International Day of Cities for Life protests to put an end the death penalty. Pushing in that fight for Florida are parents Andy and Kate Grosmaire. Their daughter, Ann, was shot and killed by her boyfriend Conor McBride after an argument. It happened March 28, 2010. Ann was 19. She and McBride were dating for 3 years. Charged with 1st-degree murder, McBride could have received the death penalty, but Grosmaire's parents plead with the state attorney to lessen his charge. "Instead of turning to anger and bitterness, we forgave him for that," said mom Kate. "We worked with the state attorney to send him to prison for life." Their appeal got him 20 y...

Justice is supposed to be blind, but not as blind as the U.S. Supreme Court when it ruled in 1993 that a Texas death row prisoner — who claimed to be innocent, but had run out of appeals — should look to the governor to save his life. “Executive clemency,” wrote Chief Justice William Rehnquist, is “the 'fail safe' in our criminal justice system." But when it comes to the death penalty in Florida, the fail-safe has gone missing. There hasn’t been a death row commutation in Florida since 1983, the first year of Gov. Bob Graham’s second term. Since Florida resumed executions in 1979, governors have put 95 people to death and spared only six, all by Graham. In at least 17 of those cases, advocates say grounds existed for commuting the sentence to life in prison. That’s not “getting away” with anything, by the way. The only alternative to execution is life without parole. In four of those cases, Florida juries had recommended life sentences, but were ...

Prosecutors in Osceola County will seek the death penalty against a woman accused of stabbing and killing a man at an Osceola County hotel — the first time Orange-Osceola State Attorney Aramis Ayala's office will do so since she took office earlier this year. Emerita Mapp, 33, is charged with first-degree murder in the death of Zackery Ganoe, 20. She is also charged with attempted murder of another man in the hotel room, robbery, evidence tampering and possession of a stolen credit card. A notice to seek the death penalty was filed with the Osceola County clerk of courts Tuesday. Ganoe was found dead at the Days Inn on Polynesian Boulevard the morning of April 11, court records show. Another man was found outside the room with serious injuries. “This was a violent and horrific crime. Two young men were attacked viciously, one losing his life,” Osceola County sheriff’s spokesman Jacob Ruiz said at the time. The man who survived, Andrew Bickford, told deputies that...

The death penalty review panel at the Orange-Osceola State Attorney’s Office unanimously agreed Wednesday to seek capital punishment in a recent homicide case. Chief Assistant State Attorney Deborah Barra made the announcement Thursday at a luncheon hosted by the Orange County Bar Association. She did not name the defendant, but said the assistant state attorney assigned to that case is preparing to file a notice to seek the death penalty. Ayala’s spokeswoman, Eryka Washington, declined to name the defendant as well because the notice has not yet been filed. Orange-Osceola State Attorney Aramis Ayala, who took office in January, announced in March that she will not seek the death penalty in any case.  Gov. Rick Scott reacted by signing away 29 first-degree murder cases assigned to Ayala’s office, giving them to Ocala-based State Attorney Brad King. Ayala sued, and the Florida Supreme Court in August sided with Scott.  Supreme Court Justice C. Alan La...