Teen girl's killer is put to death

RAIFORD - An inmate convicted of murdering his girlfriend's teenage daughter was executed Wednesday night, after failing to convince the courts to delay the execution for additional DNA testing.

Wayne Tompkins, 51, was executed by lethal injection at Florida State Prison near Starke. He was convicted in the 1983 murder of 15-year-old Lisa DeCarr, whose body was found buried under a Tampa home that Tompkins shared with her mother.

Tompkins declined to offer any last words by declaring "I'm good" and was pronounced dead at 6:32 p.m. Lisa's mother, brother and three sisters were among the witnesses to the execution.

One of the victim's sisters, Michelle Hayes, said afterward that the execution ended years of delays that had been a nightmare for the family.

"It felt like there was closure for my sister," she said. "There is no closure for us ... We can't get her back."

Legal appeals had spared Tompkins from execution on four previous occasions and a last-ditch appeal caused a slight delay in Wednesday's execution. Because DNA testing of bones and other evidence last year proved inclusive, his attorneys had sought more sophisticated tests.

After the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the final appeal, he was executed without noticeable problems. It was the third problem-free execution since a botched execution caused the lethal-injection procedure to be revamped.

Tompkins ate a last meal of fried chicken and banana split-flavored ice cream. He was visited by his mother, Glayds Staley, and a prison chaplain in the hours before the execution.

A few dozen death penalty protesters held a vigil outside the prison. Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty president Mark Elliot said the execution should have been delayed to allow more DNA testing.

"The truth is more important than the schedule," he said.

In March 1983, Tompkins had told Lisa's mother that she had run away when she disappeared from their home. In June 1984, her body was found under the home's porch along with her pink bathrobe.

Earlier that same year, Tompkins had been arrested for robbing and sexually assaulting two convenience store clerks in separate incidents. His cellmate at the time testified that Tompkins had confessed to strangling Lisa with the belt of her robe when she denied his sexual advances.

The cellmate later recanted, saying that prosecutors told him to lie on the stand. The state argued that the testimony of the witness would not have altered the result of his 1985 trial and death sentence.

After an execution scheduled for October was delayed, Gov. Charlie Crist ordered DNA testing of evidence that proved inconclusive. The Innocence Project of Florida, which uses DNA evidence to overturn wrongful convictions, sent a letter Tuesday asking Crist for additional tests of bones to prove that the body was indeed Lisa's.

"The victim's alleged identity was supported at trial by a comparison with dental records which we find wholly unpersuasive," executive director Seth Miller wrote in the letter. "Since then, several individuals have signed affidavits claiming to have seen her since the murder."

Crist is the third governor to have pursued the execution. Former Gov. Bob Martinez signed two warrants for Tompkins in 1989 and Gov. Jeb Bush signed a warrant in 2001, but executions in each case were stopped by the courts.

The execution is the third in Crist's tenure. Florida has executed 67 inmates since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976. There are currently 391 inmates on Death Row.