State kills Dominick Occhicone, 80, and James Duckett, 68, as Ron DeSantis pushes executions before term ends

Florida on Tuesday became the first state in nearly a decade to carry out two executions in a single day, putting to death an 80-year-old man who was the second oldest inmate known to receive a lethal injection in modern US history.

Hours earlier, the state executed a former police officer convicted of the killing of a young girl.

Ron DeSantis, Florida’s Republican governor, has made the state’s death chamber the nation’s busiest at the end of his final term, saying too many families have waited too long to see justice.

The lethal injections just hours apart were the first nearly back-to-back executions since Arkansas put two men to death three hours apart in 2017.