Daniel Owen Conahan Jr, 72, is scheduled for execution today in Florida. He was sentenced to lethal injection for the 1996 kidnapping and strangling of Richard Allen Montgomery.
Authorities found Montgomery’s mutilated body in a wooded south-west Florida area where the remains of at least six people were discovered over a three-year period. These deaths became known as the Hog Trail Murders.
Conahan Jr. was convicted by a judge in August 1999 after waiving his right to a jury trial. He has maintained his innocence and argued that the evidence against him was circumstantial. He was previously identified as a person of interest in other deaths but was never charged.
The Florida Supreme Court last week denied Conahan Jr.'s final appeals, including a request for additional DNA testing. A final appeal remains pending before the US Supreme Court.
If carried out, Conahan Jr.'s execution would be Florida’s 15th this year. Florida has conducted more than half of the 24 total executions in the US this year.