Florida carried out its second execution on Tuesday at 6:15 p.m. A group of 50 people held a vigil outside the Florida State Prison, where Melvin Trotter, 65, was put to death by lethal injection.
Trotter spent over 37 years on death row before his execution. Grace Hanna, the executive director of Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (FADP), said Trotter became a different person on death row. She said he made friends and learned to love painting.
John Koch, an independent journalist who has witnessed over 100 executions, said Trotter barely moved after the execution chamber’s curtains opened. Koch said Trotter was unconscious and didn’t move after 6:08 p.m.
Koch said when Trotter was asked if he had any last words, he replied “no.”
On June 16, 1986, Trotter robbed, strangled and stabbed Virgie Langford, a 70-year-old grocery store owner, according to the Florida Department of Corrections. The attack left Langford disemboweled from six stab wounds.
She was found alive by a truck driver, to whom she described her attacker. She was then transported to the hospital, where she underwent surgery. Hours later, she died from cardiac arrest.
“Nothing I say can diminish the tragedy that occurred when Virgie Langford was killed that day,” said Hanna.
Four days later, Trotter was identified and indicted on first-degree murder. A jury voted 9-3 in favor of sentencing him to death in 1987.
The Florida Supreme Court affirmed his conviction, but reversed his death sentence, which sent his case back for resentencing. In 1993, a jury again voted in favor of the death penalty, this time 11-1.
Trotter’s death sentence was affirmed by the state Supreme Court in 1996. Since then, his case has been denied of over a dozen appeals, motions and petitions combined. Two petitions were filed to the U.S. Supreme Court and both were denied.
“It’s not a winnable argument unless we can have the court get a different way to carry out the execution,” said Gerod Hooper, the chief assistant of the state Capital Collateral Regional Counsel - Middle (CCRC-M).
The CCRC-M advocates for people sentenced to death in their state and federal post-conviction processes, according to its website. Hooper said that very little can be done to stop an execution after the governor signs a death warrant.
Hours before his execution took place, Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor released a statement responding to Trotter and his lawyers’ application for a stay of execution. The stay argued that Florida’s lethal injection protocol could increase the chance of unnecessary pain and suffering.
The Supreme Court denied the stay. In her statement, Sotomayor said Trotter’s claim is speculative because provided records did not confirm any errors in Florida’s lethal injection methods.
However, she said records reflected at least a possibility that the state’s recent executions have involved incorrect drug doses, nonprotocol drugs, expired drugs and recordkeeping errors that could hide additional failures.
Prior to murdering Langford, Trotter was sentenced to prison three separate times. He committed a burglary in another state in 1979 and received a six-month sentence.
In 1985 he committed a robbery with a deadly weapon that resulted in two two-and-a-half-year sentences. His sentencing date was June 11, 1987. He murdered Langford on June 16, 1986.
He had a troubled childhood prior to his criminal history, according to the state Commission on Capital Cases. He was fatherless and his mother was an alcoholic. Throughout his childhood he was raped, emotionally deprived and physically abused.
He entered foster care at 9 years old. His foster father went to prison, leaving him to be raised solely by his foster mother. He had 11 siblings. His only close familial relationship was with his sister, who was killed when he was a teenager.
After being arrested for killing Langford, he was interviewed by a clinical psychiatrist, according to the Commission on Capital Cases. The psychiatrist concluded that Trotter was a slow learner with impaired common sense, and that he was unable to consider the consequences of his behavior.
Trotter would not become violent unless he was in a situation which he perceived to be violent, according to the psychiatrist. His sense of reality could be distorted and his inhibition reduced due to cocaine use.
On Jan. 23, Gov. Ron DeSantis signed Totter’s death warrant, scheduling him to be Florida’s second execution in 2026. The first was Ronald Heath, who was executed on Feb. 10. He was sentenced to death for his role in the 1989 murder of Michael Sheridan, a salesman, with his brother, Kenneth, who received a life sentence as part of a plea agreement.
Florida executed 19 people in 2025, the state’s single-year high since the 1979 reinstatement of the death penalty. The state’s previous post-reinstatement annual high was eight, set in 1984 and again in 2014.
In a Nov. 3, 2025, press conference, DeSantis said executions have been carried out to bring justice to victims’ families. He said feedback from families made him feel like he was letting some of them down. He also said he thinks the death penalty could be a strong deterrent if the execution process were quicker.
“Justice delayed in justice denied,” he said.
Emjolee Waters, the director of Catholic Mobilizing Network’s Death Penalty Abolition Program, said she has spoken with the family members of many victims. She said some families feel like it's what they need, but many others don’t feel a sense of closure from death sentences.’
“It’s not justice, it’s vengeance.” she said.