A Gulf War veteran convicted of killing his girlfriend and 3 children is set for execution
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) — A Gulf War Army veteran convicted of the shotgun slayings of his girlfriend and her three children has been scheduled for execution in Florida, the fourth death warrant signed this year by Gov. Ron DeSantis.
Jeffrey Hutchinson, 59, is set to die by lethal injection May 1 at Florida State Prison near the city of Starke. DeSantis, a Republican, signed the death warrant Monday night.
On the night of Sept. 11, 1998, in the panhandle town of Crestview, Florida, Hutchinson had an argument with his girlfriend, Renee Flaherty, and left to go to a bar, court records show. A bartender recalled that Hutchinson made remarks about their argument, drank some beer and then left abruptly.
About 40 minutes later, investigators said, there was a call to 911 from Hutchinson's home in which someone later identified as him said, 'I just shot my family.' Police arrived to find Flaherty, 32, and her three young children — Geoffrey, 9; Amanda, 7; and Logan, 4 — dead from shotgun wounds.
Hutchinson was found sitting in the garage with a phone in his hand, still connected to the 911 operator, the court records show. The murder weapon, a 12-gauge Mossberg shotgun, was found on a kitchen counter, and police say Hutchinson had gunshot residue on his hands.
The Florida Supreme Court in 2022 rejected Hutchinson's appeals, which claimed new evidence had surfaced that could exonerate him. After his sentencing, Hutchinson said in court that he didn't kill anyone.
'I did not kill Renee and the kids and I believe I was framed,' he said.
The judge's sentencing order noted that Hutchinson served eight years in the Army, including in the Gulf War, and that he had been diagnosed with Gulf War Illness, which produces a range of problems including pain, memory loss and insomnia.
Two other executions have taken place in Florida this year, with a third upcoming in April. All are by lethal injection.
On March 20, 63-year-old Edward James was executed for killing an 8-year-old girl and her grandmother in 1993. James Dennis Ford, 64, was put to death Feb. 13 for the 1997 slayings of a married couple while out on a fishing trip.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
New York Post
12 minutes ago
- New York Post
The 21 cases left for the Supreme Court to decide, including transgender care
The Supreme Court is in the homestretch of a term that has lately been dominated by the Trump administration's emergency appeals of lower court orders seeking to slow President Donald Trump's efforts to remake the federal government. But the justices also have 21 cases to resolve that were argued between December and mid-May, including a push by Republican-led states to ban gender-affirming care for transgender minors. One of the argued cases was an emergency appeal, the administration's bid to be allowed to enforce Trump's executive order denying birthright citizenship to U.S.-born children of parents who are in the country illegally. The court typically aims to finish its work by the end of June. 7 The Supreme Court has 21 cases to resolve that were argued between December and mid-May. REUTERS Here are some of the biggest remaining cases: Tennessee and 26 other states have enacted bans on certain treatment for transgender youth The oldest unresolved case, and arguably the term's biggest, stems from a challenge to Tennessee's law from transgender minors and their parents who argue that it is unconstitutional sex discrimination aimed at a vulnerable population. At arguments in December, the court's conservative majority seemed inclined to uphold the law, voicing skepticism of claims that it violates the 14th amendment's equal protection clause. The post-Civil War provision requires the government to treat similarly situated people the same. 7 The oldest unresolved case stems from a challenge to Tennessee's law on transgender youth AP 7 The court is weighing the case amid other federal and state efforts to regulate the lives of transgender people, such as which bathrooms they can use, and pushes to keep transgender athletes from playing in girls' sports. The court is weighing the case amid a range of other federal and state efforts to regulate the lives of transgender people, including which sports competitions they can join and which bathrooms they can use. In April, Trump's administration sued Maine for not complying with the government's push to ban transgender athletes in girls sports. Trump also has sought to block federal spending on gender-affirming care for those under 19 and a conservative majority of justices allowed him to move forward with plans to oust transgender people from the U.S. military. Trump's birthright citizenship order has been blocked by lower courts The court rarely hears arguments over emergency appeals, but it took up the administration's plea to narrow orders that have prevented the citizenship changes from taking effect anywhere in the U.S. The issue before the justices is whether to limit the authority of judges to issue nationwide injunctions, which have plagued both Republican and Democratic administrations in the past 10 years. 7 Protesters confront law enforcement outside of a federal building and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center in Los Angeles. Getty Images These nationwide court orders have emerged as an important check on Trump's efforts and a source of mounting frustration to the Republican president and his allies. At arguments last month, the court seemed intent on keeping a block on the citizenship restrictions while still looking for a way to scale back nationwide court orders. It was not clear what such a decision might look like, but a majority of the court expressed concerns about what would happen if the administration were allowed, even temporarily, to deny citizenship to children born to parents who are in the country illegally. Democratic-led states, immigrants and rights groups who sued over Trump's executive order argued that it would upset the settled understanding of birthright citizenship that has existed for more than 125 years. 7 A majority of the court last month expressed concerns about what would happen if the administration were allowed to deny citizenship to children born to parents who are in the country illegally. REUTERS The court seems likely to side with Maryland parents in a religious rights case over LGBTQ storybooks in public schools Parents in the Montgomery County school system, in suburban Washington, want to be able to pull their children out of lessons that use the storybooks, which the county added to the curriculum to better reflect the district's diversity. The school system at one point allowed parents to remove their children from those lessons, but then reversed course because it found the opt-out policy to be disruptive. Sex education is the only area of instruction with an opt-out provision in the county's schools. 7 LGBTQ+ veterans hold signs protesting the ban on transgender military members as they march in the World Pride parade in Washington, DC on June 7. Nathan Posner/Shutterstock The school district introduced the storybooks in 2022, with such titles as 'Prince and Knight' and 'Uncle Bobby's Wedding.' The case is one of several religious rights cases at the court this term. The justices have repeatedly endorsed claims of religious discrimination in recent years. The decision also comes amid increases in recent years in books being banned from public school and public libraries. A three-year battle over congressional districts in Louisiana is making its second trip to the Supreme Court Lower courts have struck down two Louisiana congressional maps since 2022 and the justices are weighing whether to send state lawmakers back to the map-drawing board for a third time. The case involves the interplay between race and politics in drawing political boundaries in front of a conservative-led court that has been skeptical of considerations of race in public life. At arguments in March, several of the court's conservative justices suggested they could vote to throw out the map and make it harder, if not impossible, to bring redistricting lawsuits under the Voting Rights Act. 7 The case about Louisiana congressional maps involves the interplay between race and politics in drawing political boundaries in front of a conservative-led court. AP Before the court now is a map that created a second Black majority congressional district among Louisiana's six seats in the House of Representatives. The district elected a Black Democrat in 2024. A three-judge court found that the state relied too heavily on race in drawing the district, rejecting Louisiana's arguments that politics predominated, specifically the preservation of the seats of influential members of Congress, including Speaker Mike Johnson. The Supreme Court ordered the challenged map to be used last year while the case went on. Lawmakers only drew that map after civil rights advocates won a court ruling that a map with one Black majority district likely violated the landmark voting rights law. The justices are weighing a Texas law aimed at blocking kids from seeing online pornography Texas is among more than a dozen states with age verification laws. The states argue the laws are necessary as smartphones have made access to online porn, including hardcore obscene material, almost instantaneous. The question for the court is whether the measure infringes on the constitutional rights of adults as well. The Free Speech Coalition, an adult-entertainment industry trade group, agrees that children shouldn't be seeing pornography. But it says the Texas law is written too broadly and wrongly affects adults by requiring them to submit personal identifying information online that is vulnerable to hacking or tracking. The justices appeared open to upholding the law, though they also could return it to a lower court for additional work. Some justices worried the lower court hadn't applied a strict enough legal standard in determining whether the Texas law and others like that could run afoul of the First Amendment.
Los Angeles Times
17 minutes ago
- Los Angeles Times
Immigration raids are threatening businesses that supply America's food, farm bureaus say
VENTURA, Calif. — Large-scale immigration raids at packinghouses and fields in California are threatening businesses that supply much of the country's food, farm bureaus say. Dozens of farmworkers have been arrested recently after uniformed federal agents fanned out on farms northwest of Los Angeles in Ventura County, which is known for growing strawberries, lemons and avocados. Others are skipping work as fear in immigrant communities has deepened as President Donald Trump steps up his immigration crackdown, vowing to dramatically increase arrests and sending federal agents to detain people at Home Depot parking lots and workplaces including car washes and a garment factory. It also comes as Trump sent National Guard troops and Marines to Los Angeles following protests over his immigration enforcement operations. Demonstrations have since spread to other U.S. cities. Maureen McGuire, chief executive of Ventura County's farm bureau, said between 25% and 45% of farmworkers have stopped showing up for work since the large-scale raids began this month. 'When our workforce is afraid, fields go unharvested, packinghouses fall behind, and market supply chains, from local grocery stores to national retailers, are affected,' she said in a statement on Thursday. 'This impacts every American who eats.' California's farms produce more than a third of the country's vegetables and more than three-quarters of its fruits and nuts. While the state's government is dominated by Democrats, there are large Republican areas that run through farm country, and many growers throughout the state have been counting on Trump to help with key agricultural issues ranging from water to trade. Primitiva Hernandez, executive director of 805 UndocuFund, estimates at least 43 people were detained in farm fields in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties since Monday. The number is from both the Mexican consulate and the group's own estimates from talking with family members of people detained, she said. Elizabeth Strater, the United Farm Workers' director of strategic campaigns, said her group received reports of immigration arrests on farms as far north as California's Central Valley. Lucas Zucker, co-executive director of the Central Coast Alliance United for a Sustainable Economy, said farmworker members reported that agents went to at least nine farms but were turned away by supervisors because they lacked a warrant. 'This is just a mass assault on a working-class immigrant community and essentially profiling,' Zucker said. 'They are not going after specific people who are really targeted. They're just fishing.' In response to questions about the farm arrests, Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement that the agency will follow the president's direction and continue to seek to remove immigrants who have committed crimes. On Thursday, Trump acknowledged growers' concerns that his stepped-up immigration enforcement could leave them without workers they rely on to grow the country's food. He said something would be done to address the situation, but he did not provide specifics. 'Our great Farmers and people in the Hotel and Leisure business have been stating that our very aggressive policy on immigration is taking very good, long time workers away from them, with those jobs being almost impossible to replace,' he said on his social media account, adding: 'We must protect our Farmers, but get the CRIMINALS OUT OF THE USA. Changes are coming!' The California Farm Bureau said it has not received reports of a widespread disruption to its workforce, but there are concerns among community members. Bryan Little, the bureau's senior director of policy advocacy, said the group has long pressed for immigration reform to deal with long-running labor shortages. 'We recognize that some workers may feel uncertain right now, and we want to be very clear: California agriculture depends on and values its workforce,' Little said in a statement. 'If federal immigration enforcement activities continue in this direction, it will become increasingly difficult to produce food, process it and get it onto grocery store shelves.' One worker, who asked not to be named out of fear, said he was picking strawberries at a Ventura County farm early Tuesday when more than a dozen cars pulled up to the farm next door. He said they arrested at least three people and put them in vans, while women who worked on the farm burst out crying. He said the supervisors on his farm did not allow the agents inside. 'The first thing that came to my mind is, who will stay with my kids?' the worker, who is originally from Mexico and has lived in the United States for two decades, said in Spanish. 'It's something so sad and unfortunate because we are not criminals.' He said he didn't go to work Wednesday out of fear, and his bosses told him to stay home at least one more day until things settle down. But that means fruit isn't getting picked, and he isn't getting paid. 'These are lost days, days that we're missing work. But what else can we do?' he said. Taxin and Pineda write for the Associated Press.
New York Post
22 minutes ago
- New York Post
Zelensky complains that US is being ‘too warm' towards Russia: ‘They started this war'
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky chided the tone of U.S. and Russia relations as 'too warm' Saturday, while re-upping his push for Washington to ratchet up sanctions on Moscow. The Ukrainian leader stressed that 'no one has been able to stop' Russian strongman Vladimir Putin so far, but surmised that President Trump could if he takes a tougher stand. 'Right now, the tone of the U.S.–Russia dialogue feels too warm. Let's be honest: that won't stop Putin. What's needed is a shift in tone,' Zelensky wrote on X. 'Putin must understand clearly: America will stand with Ukraine, including by imposing sanctions and supporting our army. Any signals of reduced aid, or of treating Ukraine and Russia as equals, are deeply unfair. Russia is the aggressor. They started this war. They do not want to end it. 3 Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is hoping to meet with President Trump at the G7. AFP via Getty Images 3 President Trump has admitted to having frustrations with Russian tyrant Vladimir Putin. AP 'That's why the world must send a clear message: if Putin refuses to end the war, the strongest possible sanctions will follow.' Zelensky's remarks appear to take aim at some of Trump's recent comments, where he likened the warring nations to 'two young children fighting like crazy.' He's also repeatedly implied that Kyiv bears — as does Russia — responsibility for the bloody war. 'You should have never started it,' Trump pubically said of Zelensky back in February. Russia began the unprovoked invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Lawmakers on Capitol Hill are currently mulling a sanctions package introduced by Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) last month. That sweeping package further tightens the existing sanctions on Russia and slaps 500% tariffs on countries that do business with the Kremlin. Trump has sent mixed signals about the sanctions package, concerned that it could derail negotiations with Russia while also indicating that he is losing patience with Putin. Zelensky appears to be angling to pressure Trump on further tightening the screws on Russia ahead of the Group of 7 summit in Kananaskis, Alberta, beginning on Sunday. Zelensky had been working to meet Trump at the G7, which would be their first face-to-face since their meeting at the Vatican in April. 'No one has been able to stop Putin. Only Trump remains, he might be able to. But to stop Putin, one thing is essential: he must lose money. Only then will he be unable to expand his army and military sector,' Zelensky said. 3 Russian leader Vladimir Putin has sought to flatter President Trump with a painting and a tale about praying for him after the assassination attempt. AP The Ukrainian leader called for tougher sanctions targeting Russia's oil revenue, banking sector and avenues of circumventing existing penalties. He warned that 'Putin has radicalized his society through propaganda' and pumped his people 'full of hatred toward NATO, the US, and the West.' 'Ukraine has shown it is ready to do everything for peace — everything except surrender. But let's be honest: what is a ceasefire if not simply the act of ceasing fire?' he added. At the start of the month, Ukraine carried out a stunning drone attack that wiped out dozens of Russian bombers deep within its neighbor's territory. Trump had a call with Putin days after that military breakthrough, but publicly acknowledged that it is 'not a conversation that will lead to immediate peace.'
