James Robertson, 63, who pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and waived all appeals in the 2008 strangling of Frank Hart, is scheduled for execution by lethal injection on Tuesday (October 13) at Florida State Prison near Starke, almost 18 years after the deadly assault. The three-drug injection is set to begin at noon.
Execution proceeds despite Pike incident
The execution goes ahead amid scrutiny of the lethal injection method following the case of teenage killer Christa Pike. The 50-year-old was hospitalised after receiving two doses of pentobarbital during an attempted execution for the 1995 beating and fatal stabbing of fellow student Colleen Slemmer. At one stage Pike required a ventilator, and her legal team feared she would not survive. They later reported she regained consciousness, began communicating and moving with support, and has since been released and returned to the Debra K Johnson Rehabilitation Centre, where she had been held for three decades.
Robertson had been one of two executions scheduled in Florida for Tuesday, but Governor Ron DeSantis rescinded a death warrant last week for William Lee Thompson. The Republican governor gave no explanation for the decision, though he had temporarily halted Thompson's execution last month pending a psychiatric assessment. Documents show this is the first time DeSantis has rescinded a death warrant, which does not technically change Thompson's sentence. He remains on death row, and a new death warrant could be issued later.
State defends its lethal injection process
The Tennessee Department of Correction has not disclosed what went wrong during Pike's attempted execution. Medical professionals and lethal injection specialists have questioned whether a fault with the IV line caused the drug to accumulate in tissue rather than reach the bloodstream.
At a press briefing early Tuesday, Florida Department of Corrections spokesman Jordan Kirkland was asked how the state would avoid a repeat of the Tennessee ordeal. "Florida has a sound lethal injection process and protocol," Kirkland said, adding that he cannot comment on Tennessee's procedure. "We are very committed to carrying that out in a humane and dignified manner." All Florida executions use a sedative, a paralytic and a drug that stops the heart, according to the Department of Corrections.
Details of the 2008 murder
Court documents show Robertson was held at Charlotte Correctional Institution, north of Fort Myers, in December 2008 when he made a makeshift ligature from socks and asphyxiated Hart while his cellmate slept. Robertson told detectives the attack was unprovoked and that he killed his cellmate to receive a death sentence, preferring execution to life behind bars.
Robertson was 17 when imprisoned in 1980 for burglary and assault. Later convictions for escape, battery and weapons offences extended his sentence. Hart had been imprisoned since 2003 after a sexual battery conviction. Robertson pleaded guilty and declined a penalty phase, and a judge imposed the death sentence. He waived all post-conviction proceedings and reaffirmed that stance at a hearing this month, telling a judge he understood his execution was set and wished to forgo final appeals to the Florida or US Supreme Court.
Robertson would be the state's 17th execution of 2026, with two more already scheduled, not including Thompson.
