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Darius Kimbrough Florida Execution

Darius Kimbrough was executed by the State of Florida for the sexual assault and murder of Denise Collins. According to court documents Darius Kimbrough would break into the home of Denise Collins who was sexually assaulted and murdered. Darius Kimbrough was not arrested until he was convicted on another sexual assault and his DNA was tied back to the Denise Collins murder. Darius Kimbrough would be convicted and sentenced to death. Darius Kimbrough would be executed by lethal injection on November 12, 2013

Darius Kimbrough More News

A man who killed and sexually assaulted an aspiring artist in central Florida has been executed.

The U.S. Supreme Court denied the final appeal of 40-year-old Darius Kimbrough Tuesday evening for the 1991 murder.

The high court denied his appeal about an hour before his scheduled 6 p.m. execution by lethal injection at Florida State Prison.

Kimbrough was sentenced to die for the slaying of 28-year-old Denise Collins, who was attacked while she slept in her Orlando apartment.

Kimbrough’s execution will be the second during which a new drug mix is used for the lethal injection.

https://www.wesh.com/article/convicted-killer-darius-kimbrough-executed/4429307

Darius Kimbrough Other News

A 40-year-old man convicted of raping and murdering an aspiring artist at her Orlando apartment 22 years ago, is scheduled to be executed Tuesday at a Florida state prison in Starke, reports CBS affiliate WKMG.

Darius Kimbrough was convicted of the murder of 28-year-old Denise Collins after an eyewitness account placed him at the woman’s apartment complex at the time of the crime.

In October 1991, Collins was found nude, moaning, covered in blood and barely conscious in her apartment’s bathroom. The sliding glass door to the second-floor balcony was partially open, and there were ladder impressions in the ground underneath the balcony.

The woman was rushed to a hospital where she died the next day. Detectives found semen on her sheets and pubic hairs in her bed and in a towel.

A neighbor in Collins’ Orlando complex told detectives he had seen a man near Collins’ apartment near a ladder by the apartment’s balcony, and the neighbor later identified then-19-year-old Kimbrough as the man, in a picture lineup. A maintenance man at the complex also said Kimbrough had watched him putting away a ladder in the complex around the time of the murder. Kimbrough was charged with the first-degree murder, sexual assault and burglary almost a year later. He was found guilty at his 1994 trial, during which experts testified that blood and semen samples taken from Collins’ bed were compatible with Kimbrough’s DNA.

More than two decades after Collins’ death, Kimbrough is about to be executed.

“He lived 22 years too long and too well and he’s going to go out clean and easy, and he doesn’t deserve it,” said Diane Stewart, Collins’ mother, in a recent telephone interview. “She didn’t go out that way, and he doesn’t deserve what he’s getting. He should go out the way she did. That’s how we feel.”

Stewart, who lives in New Jersey, said she planned to attend the execution with Collins’ sister.

Kimbrough’s attorneys are appealing the active death warrant. In previous appeals, his defense attorneys have said the evidence was circumstantial and that the neighbor who placed Kimbrough by Collins’ apartment balcony was elderly and had memory lapses.

Darius Kimbrough says he had ineffective legal representation at his trial and that his attorney didn’t hire a mental health professional to evaluate him.

Kimbrough’s attorneys had blamed Collins’ former boyfriend for the crimes. He had beaten her previously, they said, and he had a key to her apartment. That evidence was excluded from his trial, and Kimbrough’s attorneys argued it should have been allowed to be introduced to jurors.

Gary Boodhoo, who was Collins’ former boyfriend, described the defense attorneys’ allegations as ludicrous.

“It was devastating. I was suffering a loss. Everyone was suffering a loss,” said Boodhoo, a video game designer in San Francisco. “I thought it was hateful and hurtful.”

Defense attorneys also said a juror didn’t reveal that his fiancee was employed at the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, whose crime lab analyst testified at the trial, and that the DNA testing used to convict Kimbrough was faulty.

“The defendant was denied his right to a fair and impartial jury by prejudicial pretrial publicity, by lack of a change of venue, by failure to sequester the jury and by events in the courtroom during trial,” Kimbrough’s post-conviction attorney Robert Strain said in a recent filing. Strain didn’t return a phone call from the Associated Press.

A month after Kimbrough was convicted of first-degree murder, but before he was sentenced, court officials learned that three jurors had read a newspaper article about the victim. Kimbrough’s attorneys asked for a mistrial for the penalty phase and a separate jury was picked to decide a sentence. Jurors recommended death by a vote of 11-1.

Collins was an aspiring artist at the time of her death. She went to high school in Titusville and attended colleges in Boston. She got a job at Kinko’s in Orlando after earning a fine arts degree, but she wanted to be a graphic artist. She loved cats and was “big-hearted,” said her mother.

“She had a very pleasing personality. She was outgoing and laid-back,” Stewart said. “She was very pretty, a very attractive girl.”

Collins spent her last evening listening to CDs at a friend’s apartment along with other friends, including Boodhoo. She returned to her apartment at night, and detectives believe she was attacked sometime between midnight and 4 a.m. the next day.

Medical examiner testified at trial that Collins had a fractured jaw. The cause of death was ruled hemorrhaging and brain injury from blunt injury to the face. There were tears and swelling around her vagina, according to the medical examiner’s report.

Boodhoo recalled Collins as a loving person who did work in painting, drawing and collages.

“There was such a beauty to her work, her personality, her relationship with others,” Boodhoo said. “I’m just glad he’s going to die … I couldn’t be happier about it. He’s the worst kind of human being there is.”

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/darius-kimbrough-convicted-of-raping-and-killing-orlando-woman-denise-collins-scheduled-to-be-executed/

William Happ Florida Execution

William Happ was executed by the State of Florida for a sexual assault and murder. According to court documents William Happ would sexually assault and murder Angie Crowley in 1986. William Happ would be tied to the murder through fingerprints found at the crime scene. William Happ would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death. William Happ would be executed by lethal injection on October 15, 2013

William Happ More News

A death row prisoner confessed to killing a South Florida woman moments before he was executed Tuesday, according to the South Florida SunSentinel.

William Happ, 51, was executed for the 1986 rape and strangulation of Angie Crowley, whom he encountered by chance at a convenience store parking lot

Happ was pronounced dead at 6:16 p.m. at Florida State Prison in Starke. He was executed by lethal injection.

Moments before he was to be executed, Happ confessed and offered his “most sincere and heartfelt apologies” to Crowley’s family members in attendance. Happ had previously maintained his innocence.

“I pray the good lord forgives me for my sins,” Happ said. “But I can certainly understand why those concerned here cannot.”

Crowley, 21, moved to South Florida from Oregon, Ill., just five months before her murder. She was traveling to visit a friend in north Florida when she stopped in Crystal River to use a pay phone at a convenience store.

Happ just happened to be there. He smashed the window to the car and kidnapped Crowley. He raped and then strangled her with her stretch pants and threw her body in a canal.

https://www.wpbf.com/article/william-happ-confesses-to-killing-angie-crowley-moments-before-execution/1319194

William Happ Other News

Florida has executed 51-year-old William Happ for the 1986 rape and strangulation of a woman he encountered by chance in a convenience store parking lot.

Officials said Happ was pronounced dead at 6:16 p.m. at Florida State Prison in Starke. He was executed by injection, 24 years after he was sentenced to die following his conviction in the murder of 21-year-old Angie Crowley.

In a final statement, Happ expressed remorse for his actions.

“To my agonizing shame, I must confess to the crime,” he said in a slow, deliberate voice. “I wish to offer my most sincere, heartfelt apology. I have prayed for the good Lord to forgive me for my sins. But I understand why those here cannot.”

The words didn’t mean much to Crowley’s brother Chris.

“The apology, for what it’s worth, I personally think that’s more for himself than anything,” Crowley said, adding that he doesn’t forgive Happ. “He needs to ask someone a lot more important than me for forgiveness.”

The execution began at 6:02 p.m. Happ’s eyes opened and he blinked several times. He closed them and opened them again two minutes later. He then yawned and his jaw dropped open.

At 6:08 p.m., the official overseeing the execution tugged at Happ’s eyelids and grasped his shoulder to check for a response. There was none.

A minute later, Happ’s head began moving back and forth and shortly thereafter his breathing stopped. He was pronounced dead at 6:16 p.m.

Happ was the first person to be executed under a new mix of drugs Florida is using for lethal injections. It appeared Happ remained conscious longer and made more body movements after losing consciousness than other people executed recently by lethal injection under the old formula.

Angie Crowley’s family gave a statement afterward.

“We have lost a vibrant young lady with dark blue eyes and an infectious smile. With this loss we will no longer experience her great sense of humor, her laughter and her loving and caring personality,” Chris Crowley said while surrounded by family and friends. “Our loss is also your loss. You have lost the possibility of meeting such a special person.”

Angie Crowley’s mother and two siblings died before they could see the sentence carried out, but Crowley’s surviving sisters and brothers were in Starke to watch as Happ was executed. Chris Crowley made the trip from Missouri.

Angie Crowley had moved to Florida from Oregon, Ill., just five months before her 1986 murder. The 21-year-old was working as a travel agent in the Fort Lauderdale area and planned to make the 300-mile drive to visit a college friend in Yankeetown. Crowley was prone to getting lost, so her friend told her to drive to a convenience store in Crystal River and call her from a pay phone in the parking lot and she’d met her and guide her the last few miles.

Crowley found the store, but she never made it to the phone. Happ just happened to be there, too. He smashed the window to the car and kidnapped Crowley and took her to a canal where he gave her 10 to 20 severe blows to the head. He raped her, then strangled her with her stretch pants and threw her body in the water.

Happ left for California, where he was arrested on unrelated charges. A detective flew from Florida to get one of his sneakers and later matched it to a shoe print at the scene of the killing.

At the time, Happ was a high school dropout living with his aunt. He did odd jobs, laid bricks and did some landscaping. He was also abusing alcohol and drugs.

Crowley was a beautiful, smart, popular woman who was pursuing her dream to travel the world. Her murder shocked Oregon, a town of about 3,500 about 25 miles southwest of Rockford, Ill. She was an honor student, cheerleader and musician.

She just happened to pull into the parking lot at the wrong time.

“They just intersected — and the odds,” Chris Crowley said. “Those are lottery odds.”

The randomness of the crime has left questions in Crowley’s mind.

“The only thing I would like to know is why, and I don’t expect to find out,” Crowley said. “I have a lot of hatred for the man. A lot of hatred.”

After Florida Gov. Rick Scott signed Happ’s death warrant, Happ told a judge he did not want any lawyers filing appeals for him.

Happ was calm Tuesday when he met with two spiritual advisers, including a Roman Catholic priest who administered last rites, according to Department of Corrections spokeswoman Jessica Cary.

For his last meal, Happ had a 12-ounce box of assorted chocolates and 1½ quarts of German chocolate ice cream.

https://www.nbcmiami.com/news/local/florida-prisoner-to-be-executed-for-illinois-womans-murder-tuesday/1931451/

Marshall Gore Florida Execution

Marshall Gore was executed by the State of Florida for the sexual assault and murders of two women. According to court documents Marshall Gore would sexually assault and murder Susan Roark on January 31 1988 and two months later would sexually assault and murder Robin Novick. Marshall Gore would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death. Marshall Gore would be executed by lethal injection on October 1 2013

Marshall Gore More News

A former escort service owner who has spent 23 years on death row was executed by lethal injection Tuesday evening at Florida State Prison for the slaying of an exotic dancer.

Marshall Lee Gore was sentenced to death for the March 1988 murder of 30-year-old Robyn Novick, whose nude body was found dumped in rural Miami-Dade County. Gore was also convicted of killing another woman, Susan Roark, and of the attempted murder of a third woman.

In addition to the two death sentences, Gore was given seven life sentences plus another 110 years in a case involving the attempted murder.

Gore was pronounced dead at 6:12 p.m. Tuesday following an injection at Florida State Prison, authorities said.

Earlier, Corrections Department spokeswoman Jessica Cary said Gore requested a last meal of a sausage and pepperoni pizza, but he did not eat it. Gore did drink a soda, however, and met with both his spiritual adviser and one of his attorneys.

This is the fourth time Gore’s execution has been scheduled this year. Twice, courts put the execution on hold due to insanity claims. Attorney General Pam Bondi’s staff also once asked that it be postponed because it conflicted with her political fundraiser.

On Monday, Gore’s attorneys asked for a stay from the U.S. Supreme Court.

The 49-year-old Gore says he suffers from delusions related to a conspiracy theory in which the purpose of his execution is so that the elite and wealthy people can harvest his organs. Gore has also said he is being targeted by satanic worshippers for human sacrifice, that he hears voices telling him to hang himself and that he was somehow injected with the virus that causes tuberculosis.

The appeals judges sided with a panel of state-appointed mental health experts who concluded Gore’s “insanity” was all an act “designed to mislead the panel and avoid responsibility for his past actions.”

Gore was arrested after attacking a third woman, who survived, and later testified at his trial in connection with Novick’s death. The survivor said Gore beat her with a rock, choked, raped and stabbed her, leaving her near where Novick’s body was found.

The FBI tracked the woman’s stolen car to Paducah, Ky., and arrested Gore. When he was found, he had the woman’s bank and credit cards in his jacket pocket, according to court documents.

Upon questioning about all three crimes and shown pictures of Novick’s body, police said his eyes filled with tears and he said, “If I did this, I deserve the death penalty.”

Gore initially denied knowing any of the women, according to police. But he later testified that all three women worked for him at an escort service.

https://www.baynews9.com/fl/tampa/news/2013/10/1/Execution_set_for_Fla__man_in_woman_s_slaying

John Ferguson Florida Death Row

John Ferguson was executed by the State of Florida for eight murders. According to court documents John Ferguson and two accomplices: Marvin Francois and Beauford White would pull off a home invasion that would leave six people dead. A year later John Ferguson would shoot and kill two teenagers during another robbery. John Ferguson would be convicted and sentenced to death. John Ferguson would be executed on August 5, 2013 by lethal injection

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A man convicted of murdering eight people in the late 1970s was executed Monday night at the Florida State Prison, despite his lawyers’ pleas that he was too mentally ill to be put to death.

John Errol Ferguson, 65, died at 6:17 p.m., following a lethal injection.

The execution came less than two hours after the U.S. Supreme Court denied a final request for a stay.

Before the execution, Ferguson made a brief but unintelligible statement before 25 witnesses. At about three minutes into the procedure, he moved his head, strained his neck, moved his feet, put his head back down and closed his eyes.

The entire execution took 16 minutes.

About three dozen people protested across the street from the prison.

Ferguson and two others were convicted of murdering six people in 1977 during a robbery at in Miami-Dade County house used by marijuana dealers. Ferguson dressed as a utility worker to gain access and let his accomplices inside. Most of the victims were friends who happened to drop by the house while Ferguson and the other men were there. The victims were blindfolded and bound, and the encounter turned violent after a mask fell off one of Ferguson’s gang members and his face was spotted by a victim.

The decision was made to kill all eight people in the house. Two survived. At the time, it was the worst mass slaying ever in Miami-Dade County.

Ferguson also was convicted of the 1978 murder of a 17-year-old couple, Brian Glenfeldt and Belinda Worley. They were shot as Ferguson, dressed as a police officer, tried to rob them while they were parked at a lovers’ lane. Worley was raped.

The randomness of the crime and the youth of the two victims stunned many in Miami. Ferguson confessed to killing “the two kids” after he was arrested in April 1978 for the earlier killings, court records show.

Worley’s mother, Edna Worley, waited for decades for Ferguson’s execution but died last year.

Ferguson was sentenced to die in both cases; he unsuccessfully used the insanity defense in the trial over the teenagers’ murders.

The issue of Ferguson’s mental stability was a current that ran through his life, and his execution came after months of court appeals. Ferguson’s lawyers said their client had a long history of mental illness. The attorneys appealed his case to the U.S. Supreme Court, saying that Ferguson lacked “rational understanding” that he will be executed and that killing him would “cruel and unusual punishment,” violating the Constitution.

Christopher Handman, Ferguson’s lead attorney, said his client’s mental illness manifested itself long before the slayings. Ferguson’s alcoholic father died when Ferguson was 13, and that’s when he started experiencing hallucinations, family members told the attorney. Ferguson also experienced abuse by his mother’s boyfriends, then was abandoned by his mom and raised by his sisters in a vermin-infested shack in Miami-Dade County.

When he was 21, he was shot in the head by a police officer in Miami. For several years in the 1970s, Ferguson was in a state mental hospital and was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia; he was twice found not guilty of crimes by reason of insanity. Handman said one doctor wrote that Ferguson should not be released because he was a danger to himself and to society

But later, committed the murders in the house used he was released and, months by marijuana leaders.

Christopher Handman, an attorney for Ferguson, said Monday in a statement that he was disappointed in the Supreme Court’s decision, denying his client a stay of execution.

“Mr. Ferguson is insane and incompetent for execution by any measure,” Handman said. “He has a fixed delusion that he is the ‘Prince of God’ who cannot be killed and will rise up after his execution to fight alongside Jesus and save America from a communist plot. He has no rational understanding of the reason for his execution or the effect the death penalty will have upon him.”

Earlier in the day, Ferguson chose to eat the same food other prisoners were being served as his final meal: A meat and vegetable patty, white bread, stewed tomatoes, potato salad, carrots and iced tea.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/08/05/convicted-mass-murderer-executed-in-florida/2621285/

William Van Poyck Florida Execution

William Van Poyck was executed by the State of Florida for the murder of a prison guard during an escape. According to court documents William Van Poyck and Frank Valdes would ambush prison guards while they were transporting inmate James O’Brien to a medical appointment outside of the prison. Correctional officer Fred Griffis was fatally shot in the chest. Unable to complete the escape William Van Poyck and Frank Valdes would take off and were pursued by police until they hit a tree and were arrested.

William Van Poyck and Frank Valdes were both convicted and sentenced to death. Frank Valdez was murdered in prison by correctional guards in 1999. William Van Poyck would be executed by lethal injection on June 12 2013

William Van Poyck More News

In the summer of 1987, sleep deprived from a 48-hour cocaine bender, a Miami bank robber named William Van Poyck hatched a last-minute plan.

A prison break. Quick. Easy.

He enlisted an accomplice, fellow bank robber Frank Valdes, and they drove to West Palm Beach in a red Cadillac. A jailed buddy had an appointment with a downtown dermatologist, and in a few minutes, they’d have him out of the prison van, into the Cadillac and on the way to freedom.

But the prison guards were defiant and one of them was shot dead. Van Poyck and Valdes left their friend behind and fled at 100 mph down Palm Beach Lakes Boulevard. Van Poyck blasted rounds at pursuing police officers, who peeked over their dashboards but refused to back off. Suddenly Valdes lost control and crumpled the Cadillac into a palm tree.

Now, almost 26 years after correctional officer Fred Griffis died from three bullets, Van Poyck, 58, is scheduled to die for his role in the crime. Executioners at the Florida State Prison in Raiford have orders to inject Van Poyck with lethal chemicals at 6 p.m. Wednesday.

Van Poyck maintains he didn’t pull the trigger and the jury that gave him a death sentence never heard the full story. So far, appeals courts have said it doesn’t matter under the law.

“They took one good man’s life,” said Norman Traylor, 58, a cousin of Griffis. He was in the room when the sentence came down. “He had no regret, no remorse.”

By 1987, Miami was dealing with cocaine-fueled hell-raisers, but West Palm Beach was not. On June 24, Van Poyck’s cinematic blitz brought all of crime’s worst aspects — drugs, murder, a high-speed chase — deep into the urban core.

The stunned employees of the dermatology office watched Griffis slump against their building as blood pooled around him.

“Unfortunately, we saw more than we ever wanted to experience,” said Dr. Steven P. Rosenberg, who has since relocated from North Olive Avenue. Although Rosenberg believes everyone deserves quality medical care, he asked the Department of Corrections to find another dermatologist.

Van Poyck could not be interviewed for this article because the DOC denied a Sun Sentinel request. But he has published a memoir, and he maintains a blog through his sister, Lisa, who lives in Virginia.

“I have thought of Fred many times over the years and grieved over his senseless death,” he said in the blog. But of Griffis’ family, he wrote: “I suspect when I’m gone, if they search their hearts, they will grasp the emptiness of the closure promised by the revenge of capital punishment.”

Van Poyck and his allies treat it as fact that Valdes fired the shots that killed Griffis.

They say Griffis’ blood was on Valdes, not Van Poyck. But courts snubbed a request for DNA tests. They say even if Van Poyck can prove Valdes pulled the trigger, it wouldn’t change the death sentence. Under Florida’s felony murder statute, a felon whose crime gets someone killed is culpable in the homicide.

The person who squeezed the trigger and killed Griffis may never been known. Valdes was beaten to death in prison in 1999. Rosenberg said neither he nor the other employees could tell who was who. They even thought it was a SWAT operation at first.

One man, Steven Turner, says the ambush is “still fresh” in his mind.

Turner was Griffis’ partner on transport duty that day. They drove an inmate named James O’Brien (convicted of felony murder) from Glades Correctional Institution in Belle Glade to Rosenberg’s office for a skin cancer examination.

Van Poyck and O’Brien had done time together, and Van Poyck, a sharp jailhouse lawyer, had made O’Brien’s case his mission. But the law wouldn’t budge. So O’Brien tipped off Van Poyck from prison about the doctor’s appointment.

Griffis parked, and Turner glanced down at some paperwork. When he looked up, a 9mm was pointing at his head. Van Poyck ordered him under the van. Valdes, meanwhile, ordered Griffis to give him the keys to the padlock.

Instead, Griffis chucked them into a bush. It was the last choice he ever made.

Because he was underneath the van, Turner testified, he didn’t know for sure who shot Griffis.

He was sure that it was Van Poyck who aimed the pistol at his own forehead. (Van Poyck denies he tried to kill Turner.)

“I watched the trigger go down, and by the grace of God it did not go off,” Turner said by phone from Georgia, where he now works as a contractor. “I will remember that for the rest of my born days.”

Van Poyck and Valdes left O’Brien — who ended up back in prison — and fled.

Nearby in a squad car was Freddy N. Naranjo. He was 10 days out of the police academy, working at the West Palm Beach Police Department, and starting a new life in Florida with his young family.

The call came over the radio, and almost simultaneously, a red Cadillac screamed across his field of vision.

“My partner was saying, ‘Don’t lose sight of him. Don’t lose sight of him,'” said Naranjo, 54, now a detective planning to retire next year.

They gave chase, too high on adrenaline to think about the bullets. “Only in the movies” are windshields bulletproof, Naranjo said.

They were near Palm Beach International Airport when Valdes slammed into the palm tree.

Sometimes Van Poyck, his sister and friends wonder what the jury would have done if it had known at sentencing that Valdes was the trigger man. In the flurry of appeals leading up to this week’s execution, the defense team has focused on that point, among other more technical arguments.

Mark Wilensky was Valdes’ first lawyer in the case. He said he “always found the sentence troubling and the situation troubling from Day One.”

“There were a number of questions that remain unanswered,” he said.

Meanwhile, many who want Van Poyck dead are hesitant to say much, lest their words somehow delay the execution.

“I’d rather be more safe than sorry until justice 100 percent prevails,” Turner said. “It’s 26 years waiting for justice to prevail.”

But Van Poyck’s last day will be doleful for the people who love him. They say he is calmer now and finally capable of living up to the potential he showed as a smart kid from Miami whose father was an airline executive.

He wrote recently to Guy Moore, his old halfway house director in Tallahassee: “It is my eternal regret that I failed to live up to your expectations.”

Van Poyck ran away from that halfway house a few times in the 1960s and finally just didn’t come back. He was a professional criminal after that.

“God,” Moore said. “What if he’d gone back to Tallahassee? Maybe he’d have gone to school. Maybe he’d have channeled all that energy.”

https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/fl-xpm-2013-06-08-fl-william-van-poyck-20130521-story.html