The latest person to be executed in the state of Florida this year was responsible for one of the most cruel cases in history according to the prosecutor.
Mark Allen Geralds was executed on December 9 for a brutal murder in 1989 and the 58 year-old man marks the 18th person executed in Florida this year. He was pronounced dead at 6:15 p.m. after being given a lethal injection, as the 18th individual executed from death row, Florida, continues to extend its state record for total executions in a single year.
Geralds was convicted of fatally stabbing and beating a mother Tressa Pettibone during a home invasion on February 1, 1989. The case was considered particularly gruesome, with the prosecutor at the time, Jim Appleman calling the murder one of the ‘cruelest cases ever’ in the region.
According to an archived Associated Press report, Appleman added: “The cruel beating he put on Tressa Pettibone is outrageous."
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The prosecution team told juros at the time that Geralds was at the home looking for $7,000 in cash he knew was in the home, beating Pettibone for answers on it.
The prosecution team added: “For 20 minutes, Tressa Pettibone suffered an agonizing beating and torture.
“She bled to death in her own home. A woman who was a caring person ... And in her own home, she took the last gasps of breath that she could and sucked blood into her lungs."
Attorney General James Uthmeier filed a document with the death warrant that even revealed that the woman’s body was discovered by her eight-year-old son when he arrived home from school.
The document read: “There were two stab wounds on the right side of Ms. Pettibone’s neck, and one fatal stab wound on the left side.
“The wounds were consistent with a knife found in the kitchen sink. The medical examiner found numerous bruises and abrasions on Ms. Pettibone’s head, face, chest, and abdomen that were caused by some form of blunt trauma.
“The medical examiner also determined that … Ms. Pettibone’s wrists had been bound with a plastic tie for at least 20 minutes prior to her death.”
After Geralds death warrant was signed last month, and his execution date was set, he told the judge he had no interest in fighting the execution. Geralds also declined a last meal and did not meet with any spiritual advisor prior to his death.
Gerrard Kaonga