June 24 (UPI) -- Thomas Gudinas was executed Tuesday in Florida for the 1994 rape and murder of a woman outside an Orlando bar. His execution came hours after the U.S. Supreme Court denied an appeal from his attorneys, who argued he was too mentally ill to be put to death.
Gudinas, 51, was executed by lethal injection and pronounced dead at 6:13 p.m. EDT, at Florida state prison near Starke. Gudinas made a final statement, which was inaudible, but a spokesperson for Gov. Ron DeSantis said he repented and made a reference to Jesus.
Gudinas becomes the 24th inmate executed in the United States this year and the seventh in Florida, the most of any state.
Ted Veerman, communications director of the Florida Department of Corrections told reporters prior to the execution that Gudinas awake at 4:45 a.m. Tuesday and was provided his last meal. His final visitor of the day was his mother, Veerman said.
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"He's calm and in good spirits," he said.
The execution began at 6 p.m. and was carried out "without incident," Veerman said in a later update to the press.
Gudinas was convicted of first-degree murder and two counts of sexual battery in the death of Michelle McGrath, 27, as she left an Orlando nightclub 31 years ago. Her body was found battered and nude in a nearby alley.
The "cause of death was a brain hemorrhage resulting from blunt force injuries to her head, probably inflicted by a stomping type blow from a boot," according to the medical examiner and restated in last week's opinion by the Florida Supreme Court on review of appeal.
According to the medical examiner, McGrath was alive and conscious during portions of the attack, which Dr. Thomas Hegert testified was "savage and inhuman."
"The agony, the pain, the horror and the fear she must have felt as she was beaten and raped in this alleyway is beyond comprehension," according to court documents attached to Gudinas' death warrant. "During this time she must have experienced the anxiety, the emotional strain and fear of knowing her impending doom."
Gudinas' sentence was upheld twice by the Supreme Court of Florida.
On Tuesday, the U.S. Supreme Court denied an appeal from his attorney, who argued Gudinas suffered from personality disorders and had an IQ of 85, making him mentally unfit to be executed. Attorney Ali Shakoor also questioned Florida's "process for determining who lives and who dies."
Shakoor argued DeSantis signed his fourth client's death warrant in less than a year, saying the governor's focus on him "is peculiar and concerning."
"Granting the governor unfettered discretion has, in practice, led to a completely arbitrary process for determining who lives and who dies," the petition stated. "There are no articulated limits to the executive discretion, there are no guidelines for the selection process and the entire process is cloaked in secrecy."
The state attorney general's office countered, saying the clemency process and the governor's "absolute discretion to issue death warrants are constitutional."
