Edward Zakrzewski was executed Thursday evening for the 1994 murders of his wife and two children in their Okaloosa County home, as Florida set a modern-era record for executions in a year.
Zakrzewski, 60, was pronounced dead at 6:12 p.m. at Florida State Prison, according to the state Department of Corrections. He was the ninth inmate put to death by lethal injection this year. Gov. Ron DeSantis has signed death warrants for two more executions in August.
Thursday’s execution came a day after the U.S. Supreme Court rejected a final attempt to spare Zakrzewski.
Zakrzewski was convicted of using a crowbar, a rope and a machete to murder his wife, Sylvia, 7-year-old son, Edward, and 5-year-old daughter, Anna, after his wife wanted a divorce. He fled to Hawaii after the murders and lived there for four months before turning himself in, according to a Florida Supreme Court decision. He pleaded guilty to the murders.
DeSantis on July 1 signed a death warrant for Zakrzewski. The previous modern-era record for executions in a year was eight in 1984 and 2014. That era represents the time since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976 after a U.S. Supreme Court decision halted executions in 1972.
DeSantis also has signed a death warrant for Kayle Bates, who was convicted in the 1982 murder of a woman who was abducted from a Bay County insurance office. Attorneys for Bates, who is scheduled to be executed Aug. 19, have filed an appeal at the Florida Supreme Court.
In addition, DeSantis this week signed a death warrant for Curtis Windom, who was convicted of killing three people in 1992 in Orange County. Windom is scheduled to be executed Aug. 28.
As they tried to halt Thursday’s execution, Zakrzewski’s attorneys focused on jury recommendations and a judge’s decisions in 1996 that resulted in three death sentences.
The jury voted 7-5 to recommend death sentences in the murders of Sylvia Zakrzewski and the 7-year-old boy. The jury deadlocked 6-6 in its recommendation in the murder of Anna Zakrzewski.
Circuit Judge G. Robert Barron overrode the jury decision on the deadlock, which otherwise would have led to one life sentence. Also, current Florida law requires that at least eight jurors recommend death for such a sentence to be imposed, while almost all other states that have the death penalty require unanimous jury recommendations.
Zakrzewski’s attorneys contended that executing him after the 7-5 recommendations and the override would be unconstitutional. But Okaloosa County Circuit Judge Lacey Powell Clark and the Florida Supreme Court rejected the arguments. The U.S. Supreme Court, as is common, did not explain its reasons Wednesday for refusing to halt the execution.
The state this year also executed Michael Bell on July 15; Thomas Gudinas on June 24; Anthony Wainwright on June 10; Glen Rogers on May 15; Jeffrey Hutchinson on May 1; Michael Tanzi on April 8; Edward James on March 20; and James Ford on Feb. 13.
–Jim Saunders, News Service of Florida
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