About Florida's Death Penalty - Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty

Facts About Florida’s Broken Death Penalty (2025

Florida leads the nation with 30 death row exonerees, more than any other state, and just last week new DNA testing supports the innocence of one of Florida’s longest serving prison, Tommy Zeigler, who has been on death row for 49 years.
Florida has the second-highest number of people on death row in the nation.
Florida was the first state to execute someone after the death penalty was reinstated by the U.S. Supreme Court (John Spenkelink in 1979).
Florida’s sentencing statute has been struck down as unconstitutional four times by the U.S. Supreme Court.
The state has a dark history of botched executions, including fiery deaths in the electric chair for Pedro Medina in 1997 and the horrifically botched lethal injection of Ángel Díaz in 2006.
Florida regularly executes people with severe mental illness, including schizophrenia (John Ferguson in 2013 and Duane Owen in 2023).
Visitation rules for those facing execution are complex and confusing, meant to dehumanize the prisoner’s last days and often prevent last visits with family and friends. The prisoner is not allowed to have any family members witness the execution, despite that process being common in most states.
In 2023, Florida enacted two laws expanding the death penalty, which clearly violate the constitution and prior legal rulings:
Lowering the jury threshold: Reduced the jury vote required for a death sentence from unanimous (12-0) to 8-4, the lowest in the nation, violating Hurst v. Florida (2016).

Expanding death-eligible crimes: Authorized the death penalty for crimes that do not result in the victim’s death, violating Kennedy v. Louisiana (2008).

In 2023, Florida imposed five new death sentences, leading the nation. In 2024, Florida again led with seven new death sentences.
After a nearly four-year pause, Florida executed six people in 2023, marking the longest gap in executions since they resumed in 1979.
The Governor has complete control over signing death warrants and setting executions. This system lacks checks and balances and places an enormous amount of responsibility into the hands of one individual. This process runs the risk of politically motivated state-sanctioned killings, and increases arbitrariness.
Florida lacks a meaningful clemency process and prevents the condemned a final chance to seek mercy
The death penalty costs Florida taxpayers $51,000,000 per year beyond what would be spent to sentence first-degree murderers to life in prison without parole.

Florida Death Penalty by the Numbers (2024)

30 exonerations of people on Florida Death Row since 1973 due to evidence of wrongful conviction – highest in the nation. [1] Three-fourths (22) of Florida exonerees are people of color: 17 Black, 5 Latino, 8 White [1]

105: Floridians put to death since executions re-started in 1979 [2]

286 people awaiting execution on Florida’s Death Row. [3]

Over $51 million per year: the ANNUAL amount Florida taxpayers pay to try to enforce the Death Penalty, over and above the cost seeking life in prison without parole for these same defendants ($1 million a week). [4]

14,000+ unsolved homicides accumulated in the 30 years since Florida executions resumed (lack of funding prevents most of these homicides from ever being solved. [5]

The Legacy of Lynching: The four youngest juveniles executed in Florida’s electric chair were 16 years old. All four children were Black. Fortune Ferguson (age 13) was arrested, tried, and convicted in 24-hours. [6] 1877-1950: For much of this era Florida had the highest per capita rate of lynchings in the U.S. with more than 300 known lynchings. [7]

Prosecutors are over 3 times more likely to seek the Death Penalty when the victim is white than when the victim is African-American. [8]

3 of the 5 women sentenced to death in the U.S. in 2011 were from Florida. [9] All 3 are women of color. [10]

NEVER in the history of Florida (170 years), has a white person been executed soley for killing an African-American. [11]

80%: 12 of 15 people sentenced to death in Duval County (2009 – 2012) were African-American. 100% 5 of 5 in 2011. [12]

62% of Floridians now favor some form of Life In Prison for convicted murderers, while only 35% of Floridians prefer the death penalty for people convicted of murderer. [13]