Alarm as Florida rushes to carry out ‘incredibly rare’ double execution

The Florida state prison in Starke, outside Jacksonville. Photograph: Curt Anderson/AP

Florida is preparing on Tuesday to carry out the state’s first double execution within a single day since the start of the modern era of the US death penalty in 1976.

Barring last-minute legal intervention, James Aren Duckett, 68, is scheduled to die by lethal injection at noon on Tuesday at Florida state prison near Starke. Six hours later, Dominick Anthony Occhicone, 80, faces the same fate.