Gov. Ron DeSantis has signed a death warrant for Ricardo Gonzalez, the Miami-Dade death row inmate condemned for gunning down North Miami police Officer Steven Bauer during a bank robbery more than three decades ago. Gonzalez, now 56, is scheduled to be executed Dec. 1 at Florida State Prison in Raiford.
Bauer was 39 years old and a father of three when he was killed on Jan. 3, 1992, during a robbery at Kislak National Bank at 13490 NW Seventh Ave., according to the Miami Herald. The paper reports he had been a police officer for 12 years, though WFLA describes him as a 13-year veteran of the department who left behind a wife and three children. DeSantis signed Gonzalez's warrant Friday, the Herald reports.
The robbery began around 7:50 a.m., ten minutes before the bank was set to open, per Miami Herald archives cited in the Herald's report. Gonzalez and four other men took part in the heist, targeting a cash tray that held $17,000. The group stole two gray Chevrolet Caprices to throw off witnesses, cased the bank beforehand and assigned each man a specific role in the plan, the Herald reports, though a federal appellate filing described the robbery as involving four gunmen rather than five.
A Confession, a Hymn, and a Dying Officer's Question
Bauer was escorting bank tellers carrying money to their drive-in posts when the robbers confronted him, according to the detailed confession the men gave detectives after their arrests, as reported by the Herald. Pablo San Martin was tasked with grabbing the cash tray, while Pablo Abreu drove the getaway car. Gonzalez and Leonardo Franqui were the ones who shot Bauer — Franqui firing a 9mm handgun and Gonzalez firing a .357 pistol, with the fatal bullet striking Bauer in the neck and traveling into his heart, per the Herald's account. WFLA's report instead states that the court determined it was Gonzalez who fired the fatal shot into Bauer's chest.
Police later recovered the firearms from a muddy canal at Northwest 10th Street and 18th Avenue. San Martin, now 59, and Fernando Fernandez — whom Florida prison records list as deceased — helped steal the cars used in the robbery and were both sentenced to life for Bauer's murder. Abreu, 72, drove the getaway car and will remain behind bars for the rest of his life.
From First Sentence to Decades on Death Row
Gonzalez was convicted and sentenced to death in 1994. The Florida Supreme Court affirmed his convictions but vacated that original death sentence and ordered a new sentencing hearing, according to Florida Capital Cases records. A second Miami-Dade jury then voted to send him back to death row, where the same records indicate he was resentenced on Sept. 18, 1998, and has remained since. Franqui was also convicted in Bauer's murder and sentenced to death in 1994, but his execution has not yet been scheduled, per WFLA.
Gonzalez's warrant comes a week after DeSantis signed one for Thomas Overton, another South Florida death row inmate, the Herald reports. Earlier in October, DeSantis canceled the scheduled execution of William Thompson after Thompson's attorneys raised concerns about his mental capacity, including possible dementia.
Florida's Record-Breaking Pace of Executions
Gonzalez's case lands amid an unprecedented stretch for Florida's death chamber. The state executed 19 people in 2025, its highest annual total since capital punishment was reinstated in 1976, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. By Oct. 20, Florida had already carried out 18 executions in 2026, accounting for more than half of all executions nationwide that year, per WLRN. Texas, by comparison, had carried out just seven executions over the same period.
The pace has accelerated sharply this year. The Death Penalty Information Center found that intervals between Florida executions narrowed from roughly one every 16 days in 2025 to about one every 14 days between February and mid-August 2026. With DeSantis signing the state's 20th death warrant of the year on Oct. 5, Florida was already on track to break its own 2025 record before Gonzalez's warrant was added to the list.
