Gov. Ron DeSantis has signed a death warrant for Willie Crain, setting a December 10 execution date for the man convicted of killing 7-year-old Amanda Brown, who vanished from her mother's home in Seffner in 1998 and whose body was never found.
DeSantis signed the warrant Tuesday, according to the Tampa Bay Times, which reported that Crain was convicted of killing Brown and sentenced to death. The Los Angeles Times reported that a jury found Crain guilty on Monday, September 13, 1999. A Florida Supreme Court case record states that Crain was tried by jury before Circuit Judge Barbara Fleischer from August 30 through September 13, 1999.
Amanda Brown disappeared on September 11, 1998, two days after her mother, Kathy Hartman, met Crain in a bar, according to a 1999 account from the Los Angeles Times. The paper reported at the time that Crain was convicted of killing the 7-year-old girl even though her body was never found, and that a jury unanimously recommended the death penalty for him.
A Death Warrant Amid Florida's Execution Surge
Crain's case now joins a string of death warrants signed under DeSantis, who began signing them at an accelerated rate starting in January 2025, according to ProPublica. The outlet reported that Florida executed 19 people in 2025, a state annual record, and that the state accounted for 40% of all U.S. executions that year.
The pace has continued into 2026. The Death Penalty Information Center reported that Florida's execution of William Silvia on August 18 marked the state's 13th execution of the year and the 23rd nationally, with Florida accounting for 57 percent of the nation's executions in 2026 and 32 of the 70 carried out nationwide since January 2025. The organization also noted that Florida signed 19 death warrants and carried out 19 executions in 2025 without a single stay or reschedule.
A Shrinking National Practice
Florida's pace stands apart from a broader national retreat from capital punishment. ProPublica reported that 33 states have either abolished the death penalty or gone at least a decade without an execution, and that just 23 people were sentenced to death nationwide last year, compared with 307 in 1995.
No court action on Crain's scheduled execution has been reported, and whether the December 10 date will proceed as set remains to be seen.
