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Florida carries out execution of Donald Dillbeck for 1990 murder, attempted carjacking

Execution marks Florida’s 100th since capital punishment was reinstated in 1979

Donald Dillbeck (Florida Department of Corrections)

STARKE, Fla. – Florida carried out its first execution in three-and-a-half years on Thursday, executing 59-year-old Donald Dillbeck, who has spent decades on death row.

The execution came via death by lethal injection at 6:13 p.m. on Thursday.

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A request to stay the execution was denied on Wednesday in the U.S. Supreme Court, and Dillbeck was later administered the injection at the Florida State Prison near Starke.

Dillbeck was sentenced to death row in 1991 after a jury voted 8-4 to recommend the death penalty in the 1990 murder of Faye Vann outside a Tallahassee mall.

Investigators said he was already serving a life sentence at the time for killing a deputy when he was 15 years old, though he was able to escape his work detail, leading to Vann’s murder. Dillbeck’s death sentence was finalized in 1995.

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“I’m really sorry of what happened,” Dillbeck told a judge before he was sentenced. “I’m asking for a life sentence. Not for my sake but for my parents’ sake. I feel like they’re going to be a victim, too.”

This execution marks Florida’s 100th since the state resumed capital punishment in 1979.

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