As Florida prepares to carry out another death sentence on Tuesday, Gov. Ron DeSantis has set an execution date another inmate at the end of the month.
Norman Mearle Grim Jr., 65, is scheduled to die by lethal injection on Oct. 28 for the sexual battery and murder of his next-door neighbor in Northwest Florida in 1998.
Meantime, Victor Tony Jones is slated to be put to death on Tuesday evening at the Florida State Prison near Starke. His attorney have gone to the U.S. Supreme Court in a final attempt to prevent his execution for the 1990 murders of a couple in Miami-Dade County.
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Jones would be the 13th execution of the year in the state, most in the nation. On Sept. 17, the state carried out the 12th when David Pittman died by lethal injection.
Grim was convicted in the death of Cynthia Campbell. She was reported missing, and her body was later found off the Pensacola Bay Bridge by a fisherman.
Prosecutors said Campbell suffered multiple blunt-force injuries to her face and head that were consistent with being struck by a hammer, as well has 11 stab wounds in the chest. An autopsy revealed seven of the stab wounds penetrated her heart.
Physical evidence including DNA tied Grim to her death, and he was convicted of sexual battery and first-degree murder in December 2000.
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Appeals by Grim's attorneys will likely be filed in the Florida Supreme Court and U.S. Supreme Court.
Another Florida inmate, Samuel Lee Smithers, is scheduled to die Oct. 14 for the murders of two women in 1996. He is expected to be the 14th in the state in 2025.
The highest previous annual total of recent Florida executions is eight in 2014, since the death penalty was restored in 1976 by the U.S. Supreme Court. A total of 33 people have been executed in the U.S. this year, exceeding the 25 executions carried out last year. The most recent year with more executions for the entire U.S. was 2014, when 35 people were put to death.
