John Spenkelink

John Arthur Spenkelink (March 29, 1949 – May 25, 1979) was a convicted American murderer. He was executed under controversial circumstances in 1979, the first convict to be executed in Florida after capital punishment was reinstated in 1976, and the second (after Gary Gilmore) in the country.

Crime, legal controversy

A drifter who had served time in California for petty crimes, and had escaped from a prison work farm, Spenkelink shot and killed a fellow small-time criminal named Joseph Szymankiewicz in Tallahassee, Florida, in 1973. He claimed that he acted in self-defense; that Szymankiewicz had stolen his money, forced him to play Russian roulette, and sexually assaulted him. However, evidence indicated that Spenkelink left their shared motel room, returned with a gun, and shot Szymankiewicz in the back. He turned down a plea bargain to second-degree murder that would have resulted in a life sentence. In 1976 he was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death. In 1977 Governor Reubin Askew of Florida signed his first death warrant, but the Supreme Court stayed the execution pending consideration of 22 separate appeals. In 1979 Askew's successor, Bob Graham, signed a second death warrant. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall's second stay was overturned by the full Court.