First let me say that we who oppose executions, we say, "Remember the victims, but not with more killing." Today we remember Jennifer, and Glendon, and Bradley, and Peggy, and Gerald Wood, the victims of Newton Slawson.

Now, before they trot out the murder victims' families, I would simply like to say that it just seems strange, the torture that the Governor's office keeps putting victims' families through each time they have one of these ridiculous last-minute stays for the sham competency examinations that they seem to be doing. Today's killing is the sixth or seventh mentally ill person that they're executing in this state under Jeb Bush's watch. It's sick. Maybe it is Jeb Bush's moral competency that should be examined.

We are being watched, the world over. People are just shocked at how Florida continuously schedules executions, takes the victims' families and the death row families and the rest of us up to the last second, and then says, "Wait, we need to go through a new process to see if it's appropriate, and then we'll kill him." It's sick.

Every time there is an execution, they say they're doing this "for the victims' families." But when you tell a victims' family member that "you've got to wait 6 or 8 or 20 years before we kill the guy, and then you'll feel better," what that is really doing is setting these people up for a lifetime of pain and suffering and inability to begin a healing process. There is no such thing as closure. There is no such thing as justice when it's your loved one who has been murdered. For the Governor to use this as a political tool the way that he does, and to dangle on a yo-yo the victims' families and also the families of the person being executed -- Newton Slawson's mother and other family members are just miles from here -- they too suffer. They too are dangled on a yo-yo by the Governor of this state. It is sick.

And as the legislature sits in a special session to deal with the budget, it is sick that Governor Bush insists upon spending millions of dollars suggesting that the death penalty is a commodity for victims families. If the death penalty is a commodity for victims' families, then why are we using it so infrequently? And what is the Governor saying to the more than 99% of victims families for whom there is no execution? "Your loved one wasn't valuable enough." It's sick.

Statement of Juan Roberto Melendez Colon.

Melendez became the 24th person exonerated from Florida's death row when he was released on January 3, 2002. While he was in prison, he had some encounters with Mr. Slawson.)

I want to say that it is a sad day in this state, that we have a Governor who is able to assist a condemned man to commit suicide. I have to say about the death penalty, that I am also a victim. My momma and my family are also victims. I was convicted, wrongfully convicted, in 1984 for a crime I did not commit. I stayed 17 years, 8 months and 1 day in Florida's death row, and I have to say to, the facilities there are built to break a spirit. They are there to make the condemned man loose the will of living, and that's where you're going to see them dropping their appeals and ready to die. It's sad to see that Jeb Bush is willing to assist them to kill themselves. And I have to say that I feel sad for the victims' families, but I have to say that killing is not going to bring them closure. All the death penalty does is open wounds, even scars that have been closed, wide open again.

I saw him around '96, '95.

My name is Donna (indiscernible), I am Gerald's sister, and I am talking on behalf of myself only, not of my sisters or the rest of my family. These are my feelings, and my feelings only.

I am happy he's gone. I'm thrilled. Ecstatic. (Indiscernible) Execution, I agree with that, one hundred percent, and it should have happened. But my feeling is, he should have suffered, a lot more. (Indiscernible) & in the population, he should have been kept to the side & (indiscernible) Thanks.