Is there ever a case of being too old to be executed? Elderly Florida death row inmate is about to die

The last inmate strapped to a table in Florida’s death chamber was 74 years old, making him the oldest inmate executed in the state’s modern era. The next two men to die were older.

The series of executions, scheduled for the end of this month, underscores the aging of the country’s death row population. A Florida inmate scheduled to be executed in July is an 80-year-old man convicted of killing his ex-girlfriend’s parents in 1986. He is the second known octogenarian to be executed in the United States

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For some, it has once again raised questions about the humaneness of executing an inmate who may soon die of natural causes. For others, it illustrates how lengthy appeals designed to ensure constitutional protections and prevent innocent people from being executed can also delay justice.

“Is this intentional, as if to say, we’re not going to let natural death help you escape execution?” asked Catholic priest Dustin Feddon, who has ministered to Florida’s death row since 2013. He noted the church’s opposition to the death penalty, adding: “It is even more cruel and unusual to execute those who are the weakest and the oldest.”

Marilyn Gifford, whose sister’s killer will die on Tuesday, doesn’t think so.

“I’m glad it happened in our lifetime,” she said. “I wish my mom was alive to see this.”

It took decades for a death warrant to be issued death row

On June 25, Dusty Ray Spencer became the oldest person executed in Florida in modern history after he was convicted of stabbing his wife in 1992. The U.S. Supreme Court rejected the 74-year-old’s appeal, saying his liver disease made him vulnerable to the excruciating pain of a lethal injection.

Dennis Sochor, convicted of killing 18-year-old Patricia Gifford just hours after meeting her at a New Year’s Eve party in 1982, would be only a week older if he were executed on Tuesday. Marilyn Gifford said she and her family plan to go there.

Dominick Anthony Occhicone, 80, spent nearly four decades on death row after being convicted of murdering his ex-girlfriend’s parents. He is expected to die on July 28 and will become the second-oldest inmate known to be executed in the United States, after 83-year-old Walter Moody Jr. Moody was executed in Alabama in 2018 for the slayings of a federal judge and a Black civil rights attorney.

There are three inmates older than Ochicon on Florida’s death row.

The timing of executions is determined by the governor

It’s unclear why Florida executed three inmates in a row. Maria DeLiberato, legal director of Florida Alternatives to the Death Penalty, noted, Floridathe governor effectively has sole discretion when scheduling executions. In many other death penalty states, the timing of executions is determined by the courts.

About half of Florida’s 242 death row inmates have exhausted their appeal deadlines and could be subject to death warrants at any time. Michael Sheridan’s family spent a year calling and writing to Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, asking him to sign a death warrant before Sheridan’s killer was executed earlier this year.

DeSantis’ office did not respond to a request for comment from The Associated Press. In 2025, a record 19 inmates were executed under his watch, the most by any other governor in Florida since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976. The state has executed nine prisoners so far this year.

DeSantis said last year that his goal was to bring justice to the families of victims who have been waiting for decades.

“Some of these crimes occurred in the 1980s,” the governor said last year. “Justice delayed is justice denied.”

The people on death row are getting older.

According to the Death Penalty Information Center, the average age of executed prisoners in the United States has risen from the 30s to the 50s over the past half century. While some inmates commit capital crimes later in life, lengthy appeals and mandatory reviews result in many spending decades on death row, sometimes with health conditions that complicate executions.

Ochicone suffered from multiple age-related ailments, including kidney and prostate problems, according to his attorneys. They noted that he needed help getting in and out of the shower.

According to Supreme Court precedent, people who were under 18 at the time of the crime cannot be sentenced to death. But Gerod Hooper, an attorney with Capital Mortgage Regional Counsel of Florida, a state agency that provides post-conviction legal representation, said advanced age alone does not provide a legal basis for avoiding the death penalty.

“You’d have to say it was unconstitutional to execute this 80-year-old man because he was mentally deficient and incompetent to be executed,” Hooper said. “Or the cocktail of drugs they injected would cause undue pain and suffering due to some underlying health condition.”

Death row inmates with dementia in Utah and Alabama avoided execution and later died of apparent natural causes. An Idaho inmate has had at least one reprieve due to cancer and other health problems, but state officials continue to push for his death.

“He has another 20 years to live.”

At the time of Gifford’s disappearance, Soholl was serving a suspended sentence for a 1980 rape.

“I knew him as a kid, and he was a bully,” said Frank Frondel, who grew up in Portland, Michigan. “I could believe he would be so violent.”

Frondel expressed no sympathy for Sohol’s advanced age, noting that Soho’s father would have been 99 this year.

“He has another 20 years to live,” Frondel said. “So no, I don’t feel bad for him at that age.”