The governor and many Florida lawmakers want to make it easier to sentence murderers to death. But will their plan live up to their expectations or will it just deepen the legal quagmire that already envelops state-sanctioned executions?
In Florida, adults convicted of first-degree murder face only two sentences — life in prison with no possibility of parole or death by execution. For decades, the 12-person juries did not have to be unanimous in recommending the death penalty. But a series of court decisions late last decade prompted the Legislature to require jurors to be unanimous in recommending death. The question appeared settled until 2020, when the Florida Supreme Court reversed its own decision from four years earlier and said a jury only had to be unanimous that the defendant was eligible for the death penalty, not that they should be put to death.
Now, with the support of Gov. Ron DeSantis, two lawmakers have filed bills that would lower the threshold for recommending a death sentence to an 8-4 majority. The bills also would allow a judge to overrule a jury’s recommendation of a life sentence, and instead sentence the defendant to death. Alabama is the only state with a nonunanimous jury sentencing requirement. It requires at least a 10-2 vote, and it no longer allows trial judges to sentence a defendant to death if the jury voted for life in prison. The two provisions in the new bills would arguably give Florida more leeway to send people to death row than any other state. And that’s a problem.
