Man Executed for Slaying Drug Informant

STARKE, Fla. — A man who tried to inject a drug informant with Drano and battery acid, then shot him to death, was executed Tuesday in Florida’s electric chair.

Bobby Marion Francis was put to death less than 24 hours after the U.S. Supreme Court sharply limited the rights of inmates to pursue federal court appeals after missing deadlines for appealing their cases in state court.

Francis came within hours of execution last week before a federal appeals court in Atlanta granted a stay. The stay was lifted after the high court’s ruling Monday.

Francis, 46, was sentenced to die for the 1975 slaying in Key West of Titus R. Walters, an informant in a drug investigation that resulted in Francis’ arrest. The judge overruled the jury’s 1983 recommendation of life imprisonment.

Gov. Lawton Chiles, although disagreeing with the law that allows judges to override a jury recommendation of life in prison, refused to intervene and spare Francis.

He became the 27th person in Florida and the 148th in the United States to be executed since the Supreme Court in 1976 allowed states to resume capital punishment.