
After the U.S. Supreme Court rejected his final appeals, Jeffrey Hutchinson was executed Thursday night at Florida State Prison for the 1998 murders of his girlfriend’s three children in Okaloosa County, according to the state Department of Corrections.
Hutchinson, 62, was pronounced dead at 8:14 p.m., with the execution carried out about two hours later than scheduled, the department said in a post on its website. The execution came after the Supreme Court issued orders Thursday evening rejecting attempts to spare Hutchinson.
As is common, the Supreme Court did not explain its reasons. Other courts also had rejected a series of appeals, including the Florida Supreme Court on Wednesday turning down arguments that the execution should be blocked because Hutchinson was not mentally competent.
In trying to prevent the execution, Hutchinson’s attorneys cited brain damage and cognitive impairment that Hutchinson suffered as a result of his service in the Army and in the Gulf War. That included suffering from a condition known as Gulf War Illness after being exposed to sarin gas.
As an example, a petition filed at the Florida Supreme Court argued it would violate the U.S. Constitution’s Eighth Amendment ban on cruel and unusual punishment to execute Hutchinson because of “profound mental illness and brain damage resulting from his military service.”
But the Florida Supreme Court and a circuit judge said the issues about Hutchinson’s conditions linked to his military service had long been known.
Hutchinson was the fourth man executed in Florida this year. Also, DeSantis last month signed a death warrant for Glen Rogers, who was convicted in the 1995 robbery and murder of a woman in a Tampa motel room. Rogers is scheduled to be put to death by lethal injection on May 15.
Attorneys for Rogers appealed to the Florida Supreme Court after Hillsborough County Circuit Judge Michelle Sisco last week issued a 27-page decision turning down a series of arguments aimed at preventing the execution. That appeal is pending.
The other inmates put to death this year were Michael Tanzi, who was executed April 8 in the 2000 murder of a woman in Monroe County; Edward James, who was executed March 20 in the 1993 murder of a Seminole County woman and her granddaughter; and James Ford, who was executed Feb. 13 in the 1997 murders of a couple in Charlotte County.
–Jim Saunders, News Service of Florida
Atwp says
People kill innocent people and stay on death row for decades. If the state know for sure the killer is guilty, kill them immediately. Am tired of my tax dollars keeping child murders alive. Am glad they killed him.