Jim Turner
•8/27/2026
Gov. Ron DeSantis on Wednesday signed a death warrant for Curtis Wilkie Beasley for the 1995 murder of a Polk County woman bludgeoned with a hammer in the laundry room of her home. Beasley, 77, is scheduled for execution by lethal injection at Florida State Prison on Sept. 29, according to the warrant. Beasley is the 16th death row inmate in Florida to have a warrant signed this year after a modern-era record 19 executions were conducted by the state last year. The modern era represents the time since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976, following a 1972 U.S. Supreme Court decision that halted it. The state has carried out 13 executions this year. Harold Gene Lucas, 74, is scheduled to be executed Tuesday over the death of his 16-year-old former girlfriend in Bonita Springs almost 50 years ago. Daniel Owen Conahan Jr., 72, is slated to be put to death on Sept. 10 for the 1996 murder of 21-year-old Richard Allen Montgomery in Charlotte County. As they have requested ahead of prior executions, Florida Conference of Catholic Bishops Executive Director Michael Sheedy on Wednesday asked DeSantis to stay Lucas’ execution. “To punish with lifelong imprisonment is not to minimize the heinousness of Mr. Lucas’ crime,” Sheedy wrote. “It is rather to recognize with awe that God is the author of life, and to reserve to him the taking of human life except where it is otherwise impossible to maintain the common good.” DeSantis hasn’t agreed to prior requests regarding executions from the conference. DeSantis has maintained that capital punishment is needed to deliver justice for the victims' families and questioned the length of the appeals process. “I don't know if closure is the right word, because you'll probably never get full closure. But at least knowing justice was served is something that was very important to a lot of people,” DeSantis said during a July 28 appearance at the Florida Sheriffs Association Summer Conference at Trump National Doral. In 1998, a jury voted 10-2 to recommend Beasley die for the death of 62-year-old Carolyn Monfort of Dundee after he had been found guilty on charges of first-degree murder, robbery and grand theft in February of that year. Beasley maintained his innocence during the hearing, according to the Lakeland Ledger. "I did not kill Carolyn Monfort,'' Beasley told Circuit Judge Cecelia Moore during a 90-minute hearing, the Ledger reported on April 21, 1998. “I did not steal her car, and I did not steal her money." According to court records, Monfort’s body was discovered by her son on Aug. 24, 1995, with severe lacerations and bruising to her head and face, along with defensive wounds on her arms and hands. The head of a hammer, wrapped in two dishtowels, was found broken from its handle near her body. Beasley, an acquaintance of the family, was staying with Monfort while doing some work at an apartment complex owned by Monfort’s son-in-law. Monfort’s car was missing, along with $800 that a new tenant recently paid for the first and last months' rent. Shoes and a wadded-up shirt were found under a bed in the guest room. Subsequent DNA tests indicated that the blood on the shirt belonged to Monfort. Beasley was arrested five months later at a hotel in Alabama. DOWNLOAD the free Gulf Coast News app for your latest news and alerts on breaking news, weather, sports, entertainment, and more on your phone or tablet. And check out the Very Local Gulf Coast app to stream news, entertainment, and original programming on your TV.
