A Florida man notorious as the “Deacon of Death” was executed on Tuesday for the brutal killings of two women, whose remains were discovered in a pond in 1996, marking the continuation of a record-high 14 executions conducted by the state this year.
Samuel Lee Smithers, 72, was declared dead at 6:15 p.m. via lethal injection at the Florida State Prison situated in Bradford County, as confirmed by prison officials.
Just after 6 p.m., the curtains of the execution chamber were drawn back to reveal Smithers already secured to the gurney with an IV line in place.
When given the opportunity for a final statement, he simply replied, “No, sir.”
For his last meal, Smithers requested peanut butter, three packets of oatmeal, water, and two sports drinks.
A Baptist deacon, Smithers had encountered his victims — Christy Cowan and Denise Roach — on separate occasions in May 1996, near a Tampa motel located on Hillsborough Avenue, an area infamous for prostitution.
<p=Cowan and Roach, both sex workers, were lured to a 27-acre site where Smithers had been asked to perform landscaping work, as detailed in court records.
It was determined that Smithers had sexual relations with both women before leading them to a carport, where he murdered them and disposed of their bodies in a pond on the premises.
The property owner, having known Smithers from church, stumbled upon him cleaning an axe near a pool of blood inside the carport days after he was expected to complete the landscaping.
Smithers asserted he had revisited the location to trim tree limbs and blamed the blood on a previous animal killing.
The property owner notified the authorities, leading them to discover Cowan’s body floating in the pond.
Cowan was identified as murdered mere hours after being seen with Smithers on security footage.
A dive team later recovered Roach’s body from beneath the water, badly decomposed and believed to have been submerged for over a week.
Both women endured similar injuries, including neck strangulation, lacerations, and severe blunt force trauma to the head.
Roach was found with 16 puncture wounds and skull fractures.
Smithers is believed to have employed both an axe and a hoe in the commission of the murders.
During the course of his trial, it emerged that Smithers had frequented the Tampa motel multiple times and had previously “dated” another sex worker.
Smithers’ execution was noted as the 14th for Florida this year, setting a new state record for the number of executions in a single calendar year.
Two additional death row inmates, Norman Mearle Grim Jr. and Bryan Fredrick Jennings, are slated for execution on October 28 and November 13, respectively.
Grim Jr. was found guilty of raping and murdering his neighbor back in 1998.
Jennings was responsible for the abduction, rape, and murder of a 6-year-old girl in 1979.
Smithers’ execution coincided with that of 48-year-old Lance Shockley in Missouri, who was convicted of fatally shooting Missouri State Highway Patrol Sergeant Carl Dewayne Graham Jr. in March 2005.
With Post wires
