Florida on Thursday executed Curtis Windom, a 59-year-old inmate convicted of killing his girlfriend, her mother and a man he claimed owed him $2,000. He was sentenced to death for a violent spree on November 7, 1992, in the Orlando area. Windom was pronounced dead at 6:17 pm after receiving a three-drug lethal injection at Florida State Prison near Starke, officials said. This marked a record 11th execution this year by the state of Florida.According to court records, Windom became enraged after learning that Johnnie Lee, who he said owed him $2,000, had won just $114 at a greyhound racetrack. Telling a friend that “you’re gonna read about me,” he bought a .38-caliber revolver and ammunition from a Walmart. He tracked down Lee, shooting him twice in the back from his car before firing twice more at close range. He then drove to his girlfriend Valerie Davis’ apartment, fatally shooting her “without provocation” in front of a witness. Windom also wounded another man before encountering Davis’ mother, Mary Lubin, who was rushing to check on her daughter. Lubin was shot dead in her car at a stop sign. Windom received three death sentences for the murders and a 22-year sentence for attempted murder. Davis was the mother of his daughter, Curtisia Windom, who this week joined an anti-death penalty group in urging Governor Ron DeSantis to halt the execution. “Forgiveness comes with time, and 33 years is a long time. I, myself, have forgiven my father,” she said, as activists submitted more than 5,000 petition signatures to the governor’s office. His lawyers pursued multiple appeals over the years, arguing he had been represented at trial by an incompetent lawyer who failed to investigate mental health issues. The Florida Supreme Court dismissed the claims, ruling prosecutors would have countered with damaging evidence, including allegations that Windom was a drug dealer and that Davis and Lubin were police informants. The US Supreme Court rejected his final appeal on Wednesday, clearing the way for DeSantis, who had signed his death warrant on July 29, to proceed. Windom became the 30th person executed in the United States in 2025, with Florida leading the tally after a flurry of death warrants signed by DeSantis. The state’s previous annual record was eight executions in 2014. A 12th execution is already scheduled for September 17, when David Joseph Pittman, 63, convicted of killing three members of his estranged wife’s family in Polk County in 1990, is set to die.
