TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - In what could be Florida’s 14th execution this year, Gov. Ron DeSantis on Friday signed a death warrant for a man convicted of murdering two women in 1996 in Hillsborough County and dumping them in a pond.

The backstory:

Samuel Smithers, 72, is scheduled to be put to death by lethal injection Oct. 14 at Florida State Prison for the murders of Denise Roach and Christy Cowan at a secluded property where he worked as a caretaker, according to documents posted Friday on the Florida Supreme Court website.

A 1999 sentencing order posted Friday on the Florida Supreme Court website with the Smithers death warrant said he picked up Roach and Cowan at a motel at different times in May 1996 to have "sex for money." He drove them to the property in eastern Hillsborough Cou

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