JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Anti-death penalty advocates spoke out Wednesday, the eve of Florida’s first execution since 2019.
Donald Dillbeck is scheduled to be executed Thursday in Raiford. He was convicted of stabbing a woman to death in an attempted carjacking in a Tallahassee shopping mall parking lot in 1990.
Advocates like Abraham Bonowitz are hoping the execution is stayed.
“Donald Dillbeck in no other state could be executed,” said Bonowitz, president of Death Penalty Action.
He said that is because a jury sentenced Dillbeck to death by a vote of 8-4. The law in Florida has since changed to require a unanimous vote.
On the same day Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed Dillbeck’s death warrant last month, he told Florida sheriffs during a winter conference that he would like to see the death penalty changed in the state.
When the legislative session resumes next month, lawmakers will consider bills that would change the required unanimous jury recommendation for a death sentence to be at least an 8-4 vote instead. They would also allow judges to override a jury’s recommendation for a life sentence.
The governor cited the Parkland school shooting massacre, where, last year, three jurors voted not to recommend a death sentence for the gunman who killed 17 students and educators at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in 2018.
He said that he was disappointed by the decision and that he did not believe it represented the feelings of the community.
“Fine, have a supermajority, but you can’t just have one person so maybe 8 out of 12 have to agree or something,” DeSantis said. “But we can’t be in a situation where one person can just derail this.”
Bonowitz contends that the greater the disparity in votes for a death sentence, the more likely it is to be overturned on appeal — an expensive process for taxpayers.
He also says that since Dillbeck was sentenced to death, he has been diagnosed with fetal alcohol syndrome, which wasn’t recognized at the time of sentencing.
Attorneys for Dillbeck have appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, and advocates like Bonowitz are hopeful the court will step in to put a stop to the impending execution.
Demonstrators planned to gather Wednesday afternoon outside the Duval County Courthouse in downtown Jacksonville to oppose the execution, rallying in both the Tampa and Orlando areas this week.
Right now, the execution by lethal injection is set for 6 p.m. Thursday.
On Thursday, demonstrators will hold a vigil outside the Florida State Prison ahead of the scheduled execution.