DeSantis signs death warrant for man convicted of raping, killing 13-year-old stepniece

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. —

As a stay remains in place for an execution scheduled for Tuesday, Gov. Ron DeSantis on Monday signed the death warrant for a man convicted of raping and murdering his brother’s 13-year-old stepdaughter nearly 50 years ago.

The warrant calls for James Ernest Hitchcock, 69, to be put to death by lethal injection on May 7, according to documents posted on the Florida Supreme Court website.

The death warrant is the seventh DeSantis has signed this year. Four have been carried out.

According to court documents, on July 31, 1976 Hitchcock raped his step-niece, Cynthia Driggers, in her bedroom in Orange County. When she threatened to tell her mother, Hitchcock took Driggers outside and strangled her, leaving her body in some bushes. Hitchcock went back inside, showered, then went to bed.

In his trial, Hitchcock claimed the intercourse was consensual and that his brother, who entered the bedroom shortly after the sexual act, killed the girl by strangulation.

In his first sentencing in 1977, a majority of the jury voted for death. In subsequent resentencings, the jury voted for death in a 7-5 vote in 1988, 12-0 in 1993 and 10-2 in 1996.

The warrant comes as the Florida Supreme Court on Monday denied the state's motion to lift the stay of execution for James Aren Duckett, stating the awaited DNA testing seeking to prove the former police officer’s innocence was “inconclusive.”

Duckett was scheduled to be executed Tuesday.

Monday’s order called for a status report on all pending issues by 5 p.m. on Thursday.

Last Thursday, the majority of the court concurred in the stay in part because Duckett awaited postconviction DNA testing, which the court noted he claimed will “provide newly discovered evidence of his actual innocence.”

Duckett, 68, was convicted of the rape and murder of 11-year-old Teresa McAbee in May 1987. Duckett was a police officer for the Lake County city of Mascotte at the time of McAbee’s death.

Still scheduled for execution is Chadwick Willacy. Willacy, 58, is scheduled to be executed April 21 for the 1990 murder of his Palm Bay neighbor, who found him burglarizing her home.

Ronald Heath, 64, was put to death on Feb. 10 for a 1989 murder outside Gainesville.

Melvin Lee Trotter, 65, was executed Feb. 24 for the June 1986 murder of Virgie Langford, 70, who was found by a truck driver on the floor at the back of Langford’s Grocery Store in Palmetto.

Billy Leon Kearse, 53, was executed on March 17 for the death of Fort Pierce police officer Danny Parrish during a 1991 traffic stop.

Michael King, 54, was executed on March 17 for the 2008 murder of a North Port woman, Denise Amber Lee, 21.

Florida carried out 19 executions in 2025, a modern-era record. The modern era represents the time since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976, after a 1972 U.S. Supreme Court decision halted it.

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