Florida Set to Execute 74-Year-Old Dennis Sochor for 1982 Murder After Appeal Denial
Updated
Updated · Fox News · Jul 14
Florida Set to Execute 74-Year-Old Dennis Sochor for 1982 Murder After Appeal Denial
3 articles · Updated · Fox News · Jul 14
Summary
Dennis Sochor, 74, is scheduled for execution at 6 p.m. Tuesday at Florida State Prison, making him the oldest inmate executed in Florida history.
The execution will proceed after the U.S. Supreme Court denied his appeal in the case stemming from the 1982 killing of 18-year-old Patricia Gifford.
Prosecutors said Sochor drove Gifford to a secluded area after meeting her on New Year's Day, attacked her after she refused sex, then later confessed to choking her and disposing of her body.
A 1987 jury convicted Sochor of first-degree murder and kidnapping; Gifford's body was never found, and Sochor had been on death row since the 1980s.
Florida's age record may be short-lived: an 80-year-old prisoner is also scheduled for execution later in July.