The Florida Supreme Court halted the scheduled execution for next Tuesday of James Duckett, an American police officer sentenced to death for the murder and rape of an 11-year-old girl in 1987, due to a new DNA test that could exonerate him. The unusual court order, just five days before the execution, comes after the defense requested a new, previously unperformed laboratory analysis of pubic hair and semen found on the victim's body. This is now possible thanks to technological advances and, according to lawyers, could show his innocence. 'Based on our review of the record and the arguments of the parties, we exercise our discretion and grant Duckett's motion to stay his execution,' states the Supreme Court ruling, which set this Friday as the deadline for submitting the new evidence. This would be the fifth inmate executed in Florida so far this year, a state that leads the United States in the death penalty. According to the Death Penalty Information Center, seven inmates have been executed nationwide this year. Just last week, rapist and murderer Michael King received the lethal injection in Florida, which set a record in 2025 with 19 executions under the push from Republican Governor Ron DeSantis. Duckett is on death row for the murder, kidnapping, and rape of 11-year-old Teresa McAbee, according to court records, which indicate that the officer from the city of Mascotte, west of Orlando, arrived at a store parking lot where the girl was. Some witnesses said they saw the minor leave the area, while others claim she got into the man's vehicle. The next morning, a fisherman discovered her body in a lake in central Florida. For this reason, the association Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (FADP) celebrated that 'the court's order guarantees that the state will not carry out an irreversible punishment before thoroughly examining key evidence.' U.S. authorities have executed at least 21 'probably innocent' individuals, mostly Black and Latino, since the modern death penalty began in 1973, according to a report from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) last November. Alabama commuted the death sentence of a Black man two weeks ago for a murder committed in 1991, even though he was not the one who fired the gun that killed the victim, whose daughter asked for his life to be spared.
