Man on Death Row for 50 Years to Be Executed for Murder and Sexual Abuse of 13-Year-Old Niece

Trigger Warning: The article contains graphic details of child abuse and murder. Reader discretion is advised. 

A man convicted of ra—g and killing his 13-year-old niece in 1977 has been sentenced to death, marking Florida‘s sixth death sentence of 2026. James Ernest Hitchcock, who is 70 now, will receive a three-drug injection at the Florida State Prison near Starke.

Before Hitchcock, Chadwick Scott Willacy became the fifth person to be sentenced to death in Florida. Willacy was found guilty of first-degree murder, burglary, robbery, and arson after breaking into a woman’s home and burning her alive. Willacy was reportedly 24 years old at the time of the crime and spent 36 years on death row.

Similar to Willacy, Hitchcock has spent close to 50 years in prison after receiving multiple death sentences. According to the Independent, Hitchcock committed the crime in 1977, when he was 20 years old. Court documents allege that the convict was unemployed at the time and had moved into his brother’s house a few weeks before the killing took place. After a night of drinking beers and smoking marijuana with friends, Hitchcock entered Cynthia Driggers’ room.

Diggers was Hitchcock’s brother’s stepdaughter, asleep at the time. Investigators state that Hitchcock entered her Diggers’ room and ra–d her. When the 13-year-old stated that she had been “injured” and was going to tell her mother, Hitchcock began choking her and stopped her from leaving her room.

He then took her outside and strangled her to death, before leaving her body in some bushes. However, Hitchcock later recanted parts of his testimony, claiming he had “consensual s-x” with his 13-year-old step niece, alleging that it was his brother who killed her. He stated that once the two finished having “consensual s-x,” his brother took Cynthia outside and began beating her and choking her in a “fit of rage.”

The accused claimed that he had taken the blame upon himself to save his brother. Hitchcock’s attorneys’ repeated appeal to halt his execution was finally rejected by the Florida Supreme Court last week, making James Ernest Hitchcock the sixth person to be executed this year in Florida.

Florida has been signing a barrage of death sentences under Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, who oversaw a record-breaking 19 executions in 2025. The highest number before that was in 2014 with eight executions. A petition to free Hitchcock from death row was posted earlier this week by Death Penalty Action, an account vehemently against the death penalty.

The petition claims that Hitchcock has spent half a decade in prison and has owned up to charges of r-pe. However, he should be executed for the death of Cynthia since his brother, who allegedly has had a ” history of violence against women”, was responsible for the death of Cynthia. However, it appears unlikely that the court will change its decision at this time.