Florida and Alabama execute two men after Indiana death
Three lethal injections are scheduled across the U.S. in a single day as Florida seeks to match its 2025 execution record.
By Robert Ward ·
Florida and Alabama will carry out executions for two men on Thursday, hours after Indiana killed a prisoner in the first of three state-sanctioned deaths planned for the same day. The scheduled procedures mark the second time this year that three inmates will be put to death within 24 hours.
Jeffrey Weisheit, 50, was pronounced dead at 12:45 a.m. at the Indiana state prison in Michigan City. Noelle Russell, a spokesperson for the Indiana Department of Correction, confirmed the time of death. She stated that Weisheit’s final meal consisted of barbecue ribs and that he offered no final words before the injection.
Weisheit had admitted to killing his girlfriend’s two children in a house fire in the Evansville area in 2010. He had appealed to Republican Governor Mike Braun for clemency, hoping for a commutation to life in prison, but Braun declined. Lawyers had also sought permission for brain scans to support claims of head injuries and mental health issues, an effort that also failed.
In Florida, Jesse Guardado faces execution for fatally stabbing a 75-year-old woman in her Walton County home in 2004. He confessed and pleaded guilty after stealing her jewelry box, $80, and other valuables to purchase drugs. The victim had previously helped Guardado secure a job and housing. A federal appeals court ruled in 2024 that Guardado, now 64, received a full and fair hearing during the death penalty phase of his trial.
This execution would be the 19th for Florida under Governor Ron DeSantis, matching the state’s record set in 2025. Florida has carried out more than half of the 32 executions in the United States so far this year. DeSantis, who leaves office in January, has stated he wants to provide justice to families who have waited decades for sentences to be carried out.
In Alabama, Michael Taylor, 54, is scheduled to die by lethal injection for beating two people to death with a metal bar during a 1991 robbery in Gadsden. The victims were 83 and 79 years old. Police recovered the victims’ Cadillac an hour away in Birmingham. Taylor was 19 years old at the time of the killings.
Death penalty opponents, including Esther Brown of Project Hope to Abolish the Death Penalty, urged Governor Kay Ivey to reduce Taylor’s sentence to life in prison, citing his youth and immaturity at the time of the crime. Ivey declined. Brown noted that the state would be killing the mature man in the cell, not the 19-year-old who made the mistake.
Taylor’s attorneys objected to a last-minute switch from nitrogen gas to lethal injection after a judge declared the gas method unconstitutional. A judge ruled against Taylor despite his selection of nitrogen gas years prior. The execution follows renewed scrutiny of the death penalty, particularly after the failed execution of Christa Pike in Tennessee in September, which courts have largely allowed to proceed despite her survival of two doses of pentobarbital.
