Florida extended its record for the highest number of death sentences carried out in a single year to ten when it executed 67-year-old Air Force veteran Kayle Bates on Tuesday, despite mounting questions from civilian organizations and activists.
Prison authorities gave Bates the lethal injection at 18:00 local time (22:00 GMT) at the Florida State Prison in Raiford, in the north of the state, which accounts for more than a third of all executions in the United States this year and had already set a record of nine on July 31.
Bates faced the death penalty for being guilty of first-degree murder, armed robbery and attempted sexual assault of Janet White, an insurance office worker in north Florida’s Bay County on June 14, 1982, according to his record.
When he was strapped to a gurney, he was asked if he wanted to say his last words and he replied no.
“The evidence established that Bates abducted the victim from his office, took her to a forest behind the building, attempted to rape her, stabbed her to death, and removed the diamond ring from one of her fingers,” court documents recount.
The execution occurred even though a delegation of more than 130 veterans last week called in a letter to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis to halt capital punishment for former U.S. servicemen like Bates, alleging that nearly 30 of them remain on death row.
The Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (FADP) also delivered a petition on Tuesday in which it denounced that “Kyle’s case highlights the profound flaws in Florida’s death penalty system”.
“He has faced more than 42 years on death row and has consistently raised serious legal concerns, including the denial of DNA testing, ineffective legal counsel, and jury fairness,” FADP maintained.
Death Penalty Action held a vigil as the execution of Bates, an African-American man it described as a veteran dealing with post-traumatic stress syndrome and a brain injury who faced an all-white jury, took place.
Bates’ execution brings the total number of criminals executed in the United States so far in 2025 to 29, surpassing the 26 in all of 2024 and the highest number in the last five years, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.
This year’s increase is particularly attributed to Florida, which accounts for more than one out of every three executions, a total of 10, and plans to carry out two more:
On August 28 that of Curtis Windom, who killed three people, and on September 17 that of David Pittman, 63, for murdering his wife’s sister and parents, according to EFE.
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