Florida carries out two executions in one day

Florida executed two men in the same death chamber Tuesday, becoming the first state in nearly a decade to carry out two executions in a single day and putting to death the oldest inmate in state history.

Dominick Anthony Occhicone, 80, was pronounced dead at 6:13 p.m. at Florida State Prison near Starke after a three-drug lethal injection. Nearly five hours earlier, James Aren Duckett, 68, a former police officer convicted of killing an 11-year-old girl, was executed in the same chamber and pronounced dead at 1:19 p.m.

The executions were the first nearly back-to-back lethal injections in the United States since Arkansas put two men to death three hours apart in 2017. Gov. Ron DeSantis, who has authority under Florida law to set execution dates, scheduled both executions for the same day earlier this month. He has not said why he set them hours apart.

Occhicone was convicted of killing his ex-girlfriend’s parents in 1986. He was strapped to a gurney with an IV in his arm and a spiritual adviser near his feet when the chamber curtain opened at his scheduled 6 p.m. execution time. Asked if he wanted to make a statement, he thanked “all of his Christian brothers” for visiting him over the years and apologized to his family and the victims’ family.

“I know it don’t mean much, but I’m sorry,” Occhicone said. “I never meant to do what I did.”

The injection began at 6:02 p.m. After several minutes of deep breathing, his breathing slowed. A warden shook him and shouted his name, but there was no response.

Occhicone was the oldest prisoner executed in Florida since modern record-keeping began a century ago. Nationally, he was the second-oldest inmate known to receive a lethal injection in the modern U.S. era; Walter Moody Jr., 83, was executed in Alabama in 2018 for mail bombings in 1989 that killed a federal judge and wounded a Black civil rights attorney.

Duckett was convicted of raping and drowning Teresa McAbee while working as a police officer in central Florida in 1987. He declined to make a final statement, answering “No, sir” when asked. Several minutes after his execution began, the warden shook him and called his name, but he did not respond.

Afterward, McAbee’s relatives spoke of decades of grief. “I waited nearly 40 years to have him dead,” her mother, Dorthy Tula, said before breaking down. Tracy Mcfall-Buskirk, the girl’s cousin, said, “This man took advantage of his badge.”

The U.S. Supreme Court denied last appeals from both men Tuesday, after the Florida Supreme Court declined to intervene last week. The Guardian reported that Duckett’s attorneys had unsuccessfully claimed his innocence and challenged the state’s handling of DNA evidence, while Occhicone’s attorneys argued that age-related ailments, including kidney and prostate problems, could make his execution especially painful and amount to cruel and unusual punishment.

Florida has accelerated executions under DeSantis, who leaves office in January and has said too many families have waited too long for justice. “Justice delayed is justice denied. I felt I owed it to them to make sure this ran very smoothly,” he said last year.

CBS News reported that 19 executions have been carried out nationwide so far this year, including Tuesday’s, and that Florida has conducted 12 in 2026, more than all other states combined. The Guardian reported that, before Tuesday, 17 executions had been carried out in the U.S. this year and that Florida has executed 30 people since the beginning of 2025, compared with 35 by all other states combined.

DeSantis oversaw a record 19 executions last year, more in a single year than any Florida governor since the U.S. reinstated the death penalty in 1976. Another Florida execution is scheduled for August.

Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty had urged DeSantis to halt both executions, calling two in one day an “unprecedented escalation.” Grace Hanna, the group’s executive director, said, “Florida continues to expand the use of capital punishment, despite mounting evidence that it is not what Floridians want.”

All Florida executions use a sedative, a paralytic and a drug that stops the heart, according to the state Department of Corrections.