The Florida Supreme Court has upheld the conviction and death sentence of Michael Harrison Hunt, the Panama City man who orchestrated a brutal 2019 home invasion intended to silence a sexual battery victim but ended with the murder of an unrelated teenager instead.
In an opinion released Thursday, December 18, the high court rejected Hunt’s arguments that Florida’s revised death penalty laws were unconstitutional, affirming the jury’s 10-2 recommendation for execution.
The case stems from a chaotic violence spree on April 4, 2019. According to court records, Hunt and an unidentified accomplice forced their way into a Panama City home by posing as pizza deliverymen. Once inside, Hunt shot the homeowner in the neck while his accomplice moved to a back bedroom, opening fire on three teenagers.
READ: ‘Buried Alive’ Mastermind Condemned To Death: Florida Court Upholds Sentence Under 8-4 Jury Law
The attack left Alexandra “Lexie” Peck dead and three others seriously wounded.
Prosecutors established during the trial that the violence was a calculated hit gone wrong. Hunt, facing pending charges for human trafficking and sexual battery, had plotted to kill “P.O.,” a witness in the case against him. While driving to Atlanta to prepare for the murder, Hunt told his girlfriend he would “do what he had to do,” repeating the phrase “no witness, no case.”
However, on the night of the attack, P.O. was hiding in another part of the house. The gunman who entered the bedroom shot Lexie Peck in the back of the head, likely mistaking her for the intended target because both girls had red hair.
Hunt was captured the following day by U.S. Marshals while driving back toward Panama City, wearing a woman’s wig and driving a vehicle with freshly tinted windows.
In his appeal, Hunt’s defense team raised six issues, focusing heavily on Florida’s shifting capital sentencing laws. Hunt argued that applying the state’s 2023 statute—which allows a death sentence recommendation with a jury vote of 8-4 rather than a unanimous vote—violated constitutional protections against ex post facto laws, as the crime occurred before the law changed.
The Supreme Court disagreed. In the opinion, the justices noted that the change in the vote threshold was procedural, not substantive, and did not increase the statutory punishment for first-degree murder, which has always been death or life in prison.
“The penalty remains death regardless of how many jurors are required to make the recommendation,” the court wrote, citing precedent that procedural changes do not violate ex post facto protections.
The court also dismissed Hunt’s claim that evidence regarding his sex trafficking charges should have been excluded from the murder trial. Justices ruled that the evidence was “inextricably intertwined” with the murder, as the looming criminal charges provided the motive for Hunt’s attempt to eliminate the witness.
Justice Jorge Labarga concurred with the result but wrote a separate opinion noting his concern that Florida’s 8-4 jury requirement is now the “least rigorous” among death penalty states, though he acknowledged the ruling followed established precedent.
Hunt’s conviction stands for first-degree murder, attempted murder, and armed burglary.
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