Florida has executed a man for the 1994 rape and slaying of his ex-girlfriend's 11-year-old daughter.
Eddie Wayne Davis, 45, was executed by lethal injection Thursday at 6:43 p.m. It was the state's sixth execution this year, and 13th in the past two.
Davis was convicted in 1995 of first-degree murder, kidnapping and sexual battery in the slaying of Kimberly Waters, the daughter of a woman Davis had dated briefly.
Davis was convicted in 1995 of kidnapping Kimberly Waters from an ex-girlfriend's home in Lakeland before raping and murdering her, then leaving the girl's body in a trash bin.
Davis was visited Thursday by his mother and a Catholic spiritual adviser, corrections spokeswoman Jessica Cary said. For his last meal, Davis had chopped steak with onion gravy, home fries, Brussels sprouts, corn, cherry ice cream and a Dr Pepper. Cary described his demeanor as calm.
Davis' execution would be the second in Florida since the lethal injection process came under fresh scrutiny in April, when Oklahoma prison officials stopped the execution of Clayton Lockett. They halted it after noticing the deadly drug mixture was not being administered into his vein properly. Lockett died minutes later of a heart attack.
Florida uses a three-drug mixture to execute prisoners: midazolam hydrochloride, vecuronium bromide and potassium chloride.
The drugs are administered intravenously, and are intended to first induce unconsciousness, then paralysis and finally cardiac arrest. Midazolam, a sedative used commonly in surgery, has been part of the three-drug mixture since 2013. Sodium thiopental was used before that, but its U.S. manufacturer stopped making it and Europe banned its manufacturers from exporting it for executions.
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Davis has made a last-ditch appeal to have his execution delayed, arguing to the U.S. Supreme Court that he has a health condition that would make injection of the drugs incredibly painful, which his lawyers argue violates the Eight Amendment's prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment.
Waters' mother died in a 2004 motorcycle crash, but her grandmother Mary Hobbs says she plans to witness Davis' execution to represent her daughter and granddaughter.
"My daughter never lived to see this happen and that just breaks my heart," she told The Associated Press.
