Florida is scheduled to execute 74-year-old convicted murderer Dennis Sochor on Tuesday evening at Florida State Prison near Starke. Sochor is one of three older inmates scheduled for execution within a month in the state.
The execution, scheduled to begin via a three-drug injection at 6 p.m., follows the recent execution of another 74-year-old inmate, Dusty Ray Spencer, who was put to death for the killing of his estranged wife.
Sochor is exactly one week older than Spencer, making him the oldest inmate executed in Florida’s history if the procedure is carried out. Later this month, the state is also scheduled to execute an 80-year-old prisoner, who would be the first octogenarian put to death in Florida.
Florida has carried out nine executions this year, a total higher than all other U.S. states combined. The consecutive scheduling of these three older inmates has drawn attention to the aging population on death row.
Sochor was convicted of first-degree murder and kidnapping in 1987 for the January 1, 1982, death of 18-year-old Patricia Gifford. According to court records, Gifford met Sochor and his brother at a bar near Fort Lauderdale. After Gifford’s friend went to sleep in her car, Gifford left with the brothers. Investigators stated that Sochor drove to a secluded area and attacked Gifford when she refused to have sex with him.
Sochor was arrested in Georgia in 1986 on unrelated charges and extradited to Florida. His brother told authorities that Sochor was responsible for Gifford’s disappearance, and Sochor confessed on tape to choking Gifford and disposing of her body, which was never recovered.
Attorneys for Sochor have filed appeals up to the final hours. Last week, the state Supreme Court denied his appeals, which argued that the state failed to disclose a 2022 letter from a detective to Sochor’s brother seeking information on the location of Gifford’s body. The appeals also challenged the efficacy of the state’s execution drugs to ensure proper sedation. A final appeal remains pending before the U.S. Supreme Court.
Prior to the executions of Spencer and Sochor, the oldest inmates executed in Florida were Samuel Lee Smithers, 72, in 2025, and R. Charlie Gifford, 72, in 1951. Nationwide, the oldest inmate executed in modern history was Walter Leroy Moody Jr., who was put to death in Alabama in 2018 at the age of 83.
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