TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — A man convicted of raping and killing a woman near a central Florida bar has been scheduled for execution in Florida under a death warrant signed Friday by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, the seventh this year.
Thomas Lee Gudinas, 51, is set to die by lethal injection June 24 at Florida State Prison near the city of Starke.
Gudinas was convicted in 1995 and sentenced to death for the murder of Michelle McGrath.
McGrath was last seen at a bar called Barbarella’s around closing time in May 1994. Her body was found in an alley next to a nearby school the next morning with evidence of serious trauma and sexual assault.
Gudinas had been at the same bar with friends the night before, but they all later testified that they had left without him. A school employee who found McGrath’s body later identified Gudinas as a man who was fleeing the area shortly before the body was discovered. Another woman also identified Gudinas as the person who chased her to her car the previous night and threatened to assault her.
Five other executions have taken place in Florida this year, with a sixth scheduled for June 10, all by lethal injection.