{"id":2356,"date":"2025-10-14T12:56:09","date_gmt":"2025-10-14T12:56:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/2356\/"},"modified":"2025-10-14T12:56:09","modified_gmt":"2025-10-14T12:56:09","slug":"nearly-30-years-after-double-murder-florida-to-execute-samuel-smithers-wftv","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/2356\/","title":{"rendered":"Nearly 30 years after double murder, Florida to execute Samuel Smithers \u2013 WFTV"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 eJzHXc body-paragraph\">BRADFORD COUNTY, Fla. \u2014 Florida is set to execute Samuel Lee Smithers on Tuesday for the 1996 murders of two women, marking the state\u2019s 14th execution this year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 eJzHXc body-paragraph\">Smithers, 72, was convicted of killing two women whose bodies were discovered in a rural pond in Plant City in Hillsborough County. <\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 eJzHXc body-paragraph\">This execution contributes to the highest number of executions in Florida in a single year since the reinstatement of the death penalty.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 eJzHXc body-paragraph\">Smithers\u2019 execution underscores Florida\u2019s increased use of capital punishment, with this year seeing the most executions since the death penalty was reinstated.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 eJzHXc body-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.wftv.com\/mobile-apps\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" title=\"https:\/\/www.wftv.com\/mobile-apps\">Click here<\/a> to download our free news, weather and smart TV apps. And <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wftv.com\/video\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" title=\"https:\/\/www.wftv.com\/video\/\">click here<\/a> to stream Channel 9 Eyewitness News live.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/wftvapps.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/1760446569_371_APP DOWNLOAD LOCAL_1541693885678.jpg_13622062_ver1.0.jpg\" width=\"100%\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>TOP STORIES FROM WFTV CHANNEL 9<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 eJzHXc body-paragraph body-copyright\">\u00a92025 Cox Media Group<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BRADFORD COUNTY, Fla. \u2014 Florida is set to execute Samuel Lee Smithers on Tuesday for the 1996 murders&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2357,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[2652,28,30,29,2966,634,115,2904,2905,2906,1045],"class_list":["post-2356","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-central_florida","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-hillsborough_county","tag-local","tag-news","tag-plant_city","tag-samuel_lee_smithers","tag-smithers","tag-video"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2356","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2356"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2356\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2357"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2356"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2356"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2356"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}