Three states execute inmates same day

Florida carried out its 19th execution this year on Thursday, tying the state record for a single calendar year. Three states administered the death penalty on the same day, a rare occurrence in recent history.

Jesse Guardado, 64, was pronounced dead at 6:13 p.m. at a state prison in Starke. He received a three-drug lethal injection. Guardado had pleaded guilty to stabbing 75-year-old Jackie Malone in her Walton County home in 2004. He stole her jewelry box, $80, and other valuables to buy drugs. Malone had helped him secure a job and housing before the killing.

Earlier that day, Indiana executed Jeffrey Weisheit, 50. He was pronounced dead at 12:45 a.m. at the state prison in Michigan City. Weisheit had publicly acknowledged killing his girlfriend’s two children in a house fire in the Evansville area in 2010. Governor Mike Braun declined to grant him clemency for a life sentence. Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita said the execution provided justice for the victims.

In Alabama, Michael Taylor, 54, was scheduled to receive a lethal injection later in the evening. The state changed the method from nitrogen gas to lethal injection after a judge ruled the gas method unconstitutional. Taylor’s attorneys objected to the change, but a judge ruled against them. In 1991, Taylor fatally beat two people, ages 83 and 79, with a metal bar during a robbery in Gadsden. Police found him an hour later in Birmingham with the victims’ car.

The simultaneous executions occurred shortly after California Governor Gavin Newsom announced he would commute all 548 death sentences in his state. Newsom said state-sanctioned killing is incompatible with California’s values. This stood in contrast to Florida, where outgoing Governor Ron DeSantis has made aggressive use of the death penalty. DeSantis, who leaves office in January, signed the warrants for this year’s executions. Florida has carried out more than half of the 34 executions in the U.S. so far this year.

This is the second time since August that three states have organized executions on a single day. The last time three states executed inmates on the same day was in 2010. Before this year, such coincidences were unusual. A federal appeals court ruled in 2024 that Guardado received a fair hearing during his death penalty phase. The U.S. Supreme Court denied his final appeal without comment earlier Thursday.

Patrick Malone, the son of the Florida victim, spoke to witnesses after the execution. He questioned those who oppose the death penalty. Malone asked if such people consider the unending aftermath the victim’s family endures every time the event comes up. Guardado had apologized to the victim’s family and his own family before the drugs began flowing. The execution team pronounced him dead after checking for a pulse.

Florida will set a new state record if two more executions are carried out as planned later this year. DeSantis has said he wants to bring justice to victims’ families who have often waited decades for sentences to be carried out. The U.S. death penalty has come under renewed scrutiny following Tennessee’s failed execution of Christa Pike in September. Nearly half of U.S. states have banned capital punishment outright, leaving a handful of states to carry out most executions.