Melvin Trotter, 65, is scheduled to face lethal injection Tuesday evening at Florida State Prison, becoming the second person executed in the state this year. His case, decades in the making, underscores a dramatic shift in Florida’s approach to capital punishment.
Trotter’s initial conviction for the first-degree murder of grocery store owner Virgie Langford came in 1987, resulting in a death sentence. However, the Florida Supreme Court overturned that sentencing, citing errors in how aggravating factors were considered during the trial.
A new sentencing hearing in 1993 again resulted in a death penalty verdict. The details of the crime are chilling: Langford was strangled and stabbed in her Palmetto, Florida store in 1986. She remarkably lived long enough to provide a description of her attacker to a passing truck driver.
That description, crucially, included a detail that would later prove damning – a Tropicana employee badge bearing the name “Melvin.” Investigators subsequently discovered a shirt stained with Langford’s blood at Trotter’s home and his handprint at the crime scene.
Florida witnessed a record-breaking 19 executions in the past year, a surge overseen by Governor Ron DeSantis. This far surpassed the previous high of eight executions in 2014, establishing a new, somber benchmark in the state’s history of capital punishment.
Nationally, 47 executions were carried out in the same period, with Florida leading all states. Alabama, South Carolina, and Texas followed, each with five executions. This year, Florida, Texas, and Oklahoma have each carried out one execution.
Last-minute appeals filed by Trotter’s attorneys argued procedural missteps in the handling of death penalty protocols and requested an exemption based on his age. These appeals were swiftly denied by the Florida Supreme Court, though further appeals remain before the U.S. Supreme Court.
Just weeks prior, on February 10th, Ronald Palmer Heath, 64, was executed in Florida for the 1989 murder of traveling salesperson Michael Sheridan. The case involved a violent encounter stemming from a chance meeting at a bar.
The state has already scheduled two more executions for next month: Billy Leon Kearse on March 3rd and Michael Lee King on March 17th, signaling a continued commitment to carrying out death sentences at an accelerated pace.
The Langford case, and the impending execution of Melvin Trotter, represent a stark reality within Florida’s legal system – a system now demonstrably focused on the ultimate punishment.
