Gov. Rick Scott issued a death warrant for Death Row inmate Mark James Asay in August. That's one month from the ruling in the Supreme Court that the death penalty laws signed by the Governor back in 2013 were declared unconstitutional. The execution will be the first execution in nearly two years of legal battles over the state's speedy death penalty justice system. Asay will be Put To Death by lethal injection at 6 p.m. on August 24, 2017.

Swift death

Mark Asay was sentenced to death in 1988 for killing two men in Jacksonville. Retired Justice James Perry stated to the Tampa Bay Times about the historical importance of Mark Asay's death because Asay will be the first white person to be put to death in Florida for killing a black man.

In the eyes of the justice system, anyone who commits a crime, especially like that of murder or a capital offense, you are a killer no matter what color of your skin or class standings says you are in the eyes of evidence against you.

Mark Asay was scheduled for March of last year to be put to death, but his execution was postponed over the legal ruling of the Hurst vs. Florida case that deemed the Timely Justice Act was unconstitutional and violates the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution for a trial by jury. The jury in the Hurst ruling was merely advising the judge what to recommend as punishment rather than say what charge should be offered according to the crime as part of a legal system to be judged by your peers.

Hurst Ruling

It took the Governor nearly six months to reissue a death warrant for Mark Asay. That reasoning still stands unclear. But what is known is that nearly 200 inmates had death warrants signed last year before the Hurst ruling. The decisions were finalized in June of 2002, several years before the Hurst ruling. But after the ruling, some of these warrants were declared null and void.

But last December, the State justices in lifted Asay's execution and allowed executions to resume in Florida.

The bill SB 280 was signed by the Governor this year. It was an attempt to fix the ruling for the death penalty following the decision of the Hurst ruling that took place this year. The bill states that a unanimous decision must be made by the jury to put a defendant to death.

The warrant was re-issued under the guidance from Florida's Attorney General Pam Bondi. The new law states that the Governor must put down a new date for the execution of the death sentence within ten days of certification. The last inmate executed was Oscar Ray Bolin Jr. on January 7, 2016.
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