A former Army elite Ranger was executed late Thursday in Florida for the 1998 killings of his girlfriend and her three children.
Jeffrey Hutchinson, 62, was declared dead at 8:15 p.m., minutes after receiving the lethal injection at Florida State Prison.
The procedure took about 15 minutes, during which the convicted murderer shook sporadically and had body spasms.
Hutchinson had maintained innocence, claiming that the quadruple homicide was carried out by two men hired by the U.S. government to silence his activism on war veterans.
Investigators said Hutchinson called 911 after gunning down 32-year-old Renee Flaherty and her three children, ages 9, 7, and 4, using a shotgun that was found on the kitchen counter.
Earlier that night, the killer argued with Flaherty and packed his clothes and weapons in a truck before heading to a bar where he told the staff about the argument.
“Not a day goes by that we don’t think about the loved ones that were taken from us,” Flaherty’s brother said after the execution.
