Citations:
Slawson v. State, 619 So. 2d 255 (Fla. 1993), cert. denied, 512 U.S. 1246 (1994). (Direct Appeal)
Slawson v. State, 796 So.2d 491 (Fla. 2001). (Motion to Correct Sentence)

Final Meal:
A plate of battered fried scallops and a Coke.

Final Words:
Slawson gave no final statement.

Internet Sources:

Florida Department of Corrections

Orlando Sentinel

"Execution Set for Today." (May 15, 2003)

STARKE -- A man convicted of killing four members of a Tampa family and an 8 1/2-month-old fetus is to die by lethal injection today at Florida State Prison. Newton Carlton Slawson, 48, has dropped his appeals and fired his attorneys. His execution was scheduled for 6. p.m. He would be the second person executed in Florida this year. Carolyn Snurkowski, an appeals attorney for Attorney General Charlie Crist, said she was unaware of any appeals being filed on behalf of Slawson. He is not represented by an attorney.

Slawson was convicted in the April 11, 1989, shooting deaths of Gerald and Peggy Wood, who was pregnant and near full term, and their children, Glendon 3, and Jennifer, 4. After the attack, Peggy Wood crawled down the stairs and across a back yard to her mother's home and told her, "Newton did it." She died in her mother's arms.

Slawson was convicted of four counts of murder and sentenced to death on each. He was convicted of manslaughter in the death of the fetus and was sentenced to 30 years on that charge. Defense attorneys argued that Gerald Wood slipped cocaine into Slawson's beer, sending an unstable man into a killing rage. "He was friends with the family he destroyed," said his attorney Brian Donerly.

Prosecutors claimed Slawson had fantasies about dismembering women. When he was arrested, police found bloody clothing, a bloody knife, a .357-caliber gun with blood in it, an assault rifle, 180 rounds of ammunition and a Penthouse magazine in which he had drawn images of slit bellies on some of the nude photographs. Slawson's trial lawyers said Slawson was mentally ill at the time of the slayings and remains insane, but they are powerless to stop the execution.

ProDeathPenalty.Com

Gov. Jeb Bush set an execution date of May 15 for a death row inmate convicted of killing an entire family and cutting an unborn child from its dying mother's body. The death warrant for Newton Carlton Slawson becomes effective at noon on May 12 and is effective for 1 week. Warden Joseph Thompson of Florida State Prison set the actual execution, by lethal injection, for 6 p.m. on May 15.

Slawson was convicted in 1990 of 4 counts of 1st-degree murder in the 1989 deaths of Gerald and Peggy Wood; their 4-year-old daughter, Jennifer; 3-year-old son, Glendon. He also was convicted of manslaughter in the death of an unborn male child carried by Mrs. Wood, who was 8 1/2 months pregnant. Slawson knew the Woods as casual acquaintances.

On April 11, 1989, Peggy Wood, her husband Gerald, and their two children, Jennifer (age four) and Glendon (age three) were murdered in their home. Also lost was the fetus Peggy Wood was carrying, which was eight and one-half months old. Peggy Wood lived with her family in a garage apartment that was adjacent to her parents’ home in Hillsborough County. At approximately 10 p.m. on April 11, Peggy Wood was found lying on the back porch of her parents’ home, having been shot once in the abdomen and once in the back, while also having been cut with a knife from the base of the sternum to the pelvic area. She also had several cuts on her right thigh. She managed to crawl next door to her mother's home and told her mother "Newt did it" before dying. Peggy told her mother that Slawson had “killed Gerry and the kids.” Gerald Wood and the two children died as a result of gunshot wounds. Gerald had also been stabbed in the back. The Woods’ unborn baby was found lying near Gerald’s body, having sustained two gunshot wounds and multiple lacerations that resulted from Slawson’s attack on Peggy.

Slawson claimed that he cut the unborn fetus out of Peggy’s body, in an attempt to save it, after determining that both Gerald and Peggy were dead, even though the child was found in the house and Peggy crawled away. The facts from the direct appeal also described the events preceding the murders: After his arrest [on the night of the killings], Slawson told detectives that he went to the Woods' residence on the day of the murders. He took a six inch knife and a .357 revolver. At Gerald's request, Slawson put the gun in the bathroom so the children would not get it. He gave the knife to Gerald Wood to use to cut rock cocaine. Gerald Wood offered to sell Slawson some of the cocaine but Slawson refused the offer. When Peggy said Slawson might be the police, Slawson went to the bathroom to get his gun so he could leave. When Slawson returned, Gerald Wood got up with the knife in his hand. According to his statement, Slawson shot Gerald and may have shot Peggy at that time. As Slawson proceeded to the children's bedroom and shot them, Peggy Wood was screaming. After shooting the children he returned to the living room and shot Peggy again. Slawson then inserted his knife into Peggy Wood's abdomen and cut upward, causing the fetus to be expelled. Slawson also testified at trial that he believed Gerald had placed drugs in his beer, which caused him to feel odd and to believe he was locked in the apartment. Slawson was found guilty of four counts of first-degree murder and one count of killing an unborn child by injury to the mother. He received death sentences for each of the first-degree murders, along with a thirty-year sentence for manslaughter of the unborn child.

National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty

Newton Slawson (FL) - May 15, 2003

The state of Florida is scheduled to execute Newton Slawson May 15 for the murders of Gerald and Peggy Wood and their two young children, 4-year-old Jennifer and 3-year-old Glendon in Tampa in 1989. Slawson, a white man, testified at his trial that he believed he killed the family, but could not remember the incident. He suspected that Gerald, who was cutting a rock of cocaine while Slawson was in his home, drugged him before the killing spree began.

Slawson has dropped his appeals, yet serious questions remain concerning his mental stability and competency. Throughout the appeals process, he has never cooperated with his legal counsel, and has repeatedly refused to leave his prison cell for legal visits, medical appointments, and psychological evaluations.

Defense attorneys who have represented Slawson describe him as paranoid and delusional, and argue that the state should hold off his pending execution because of his mental illness. They claim he is incapable of trusting anyone, including his family members and attorneys.

As a child, Slawson suffered severe head injuries, and began having seizures, which would continue throughout his life. These factors, compounded with his tragic history of drug and alcohol abuse, have likely done little to help his mental stability. Despite Slawson’s background, a Hillsborough district judge found him competent to drop his appeals based on a 30-minute evaluation by a court-ordered psychiatrist.

The issue of mental competency is one of the most heated in the death penalty debate today. On Nov. 6, 2002, the U.S. Supreme Court granted a stay to James Colburn of Texas on the night of his scheduled execution to review his appeal concerning mental competency. The high court denied cert in that case, but the stay indicated a divide among the justices concerning Colburn’s case.

Sadly, the state of Florida has a history of ignoring mental illness cases, as demonstrated by the execution of Linroy Bottoson on Dec. 9, 2002. A mental hospital categorized Bottoson as a “latent schizophrenic” before his crime in 1979. Slawson’s case is equally troubling, and the state should conduct more thorough evaluations of mental illness cases before rushing to the execution chamber. Please contact Gov. Jeb Bush and the state of Florida to request a commutation of Newton Slawson’s sentence and a time-out on executions pending a thorough review of the state’s death penalty system.

Miami Herald

"Killer Slawson Executed After Sunrise," by Phil Long. (AP May 16, 2003)

STARKE — Condemned killer Newton Slawson, whose appointment with the executioner was delayed 13 hours against his wishes, was put to death by lethal injection just after sunrise today. When asked whether he had any last statement, he told the warden, ``No, sir.'' Two members of the victim's family were witnesses to the execution.

Slawson, who murdered a family of four and an unborn child during a 90-second, drug-induced frenzy in Tampa 14 years ago, had given up his appeals and fired his lawyers. He was to have died Thursday evening, but two former lawyers sent a last-minute letter to Gov. Jeb Bush saying they believed Slawson was insane and should not be executed. That triggered an automatic three-psychiatrist examination. The trio met with Slawson late Thursday and detemined he met the legal requirement of being aware of the penalty he was facing and understood why he was to be executed. He had also been found competent to represent himself in legal matters at an earlier hearing.

Slawson, 48, shot Glendon Wood, 3, and his sister Jennifer, 4, point-blank with a .357-caliber revolver. He knifed and shot their father, Gerald, 23, and mother, Peggy Wood, 21. Peggy Wood was eight months pregnant. Slawson took a six-inch pocketknife, slit Peggy Wood's belly open and removed the unborn child. Bleeding, Wood later crawled down the garage apartment stairs, dragged herself across a back yard to her mother's home and told her, ``Newton did it.'' Slawson later told police the cutting was an attempt to save the child's life. He also told a jury that he thought Gerald Wood had slipped cocaine into his beer, sending him into ``cocaine-induced intoxication.'' The jury didn't buy it, voting unanimously for conviction. But jurors split on whether he should get the death penalty. The majority, though, recommended death and the judge agreed.

''Mr. Slawson was convicted of a heinous, brutal crime,'' Alia Faraj, spokeswoman for Gov. Jeb Bush, said Thursday. ``This is why we have the death penalty on the books.'' Ronald Ray Williams, Peggy Wood's brother, said death by lethal injection was certainly more peaceful than what his sister suffered. ''It was so sad because they were shot point blank,'' Williams said of the deaths of his sister and her family. He called the execution ''a closing of the book'' during an interview last week.

Death penalty opponents criticized the execution as an ''assisted suicide,'' noting that recent executions in Florida have been inmates like female serial killer Aileen Wournos, who have given up their right to appeal. Nationwide, 97 such ''volunteers'' have been executed since the U.S. Supreme Court allowed for restoration of the death penalty in the mid-1970's, according to the Death Penalty Information Center, a non-profit interest group. 'This is the fifth `volunteer' Gov. Bush has killed,'' said Abe Bonowitz, director of Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty. ``With more than 360 people on Death Row it is kind of puzzling that he is killing so many volunteers.

At a court hearing in Tampa last month, Slawson told Circuit Judge Rex Barbas that he planned to continue to seek execution. ''Judge, let's just end this, please,'' said Slawson, who dropped his appeals in 1997. But Slawson's former attorney argues that Slawson was not competent to represent himself. ''He is not mentally competent to fire his lawyers and he is not mentally competent to be executed,'' said attorney Brian Donerly. The judge, though, has ruled that Slawson is capable and the governor's office argues that ``justice for Slawson's victims is overdue.''

Slawson, a former fertilizer bag stacker, had eaten his last meal, a plate of battered fried scallops and a Coke. Throughout the day, Thursday, Slawson visited through a plastic window with his mother, two uncles and a cousin, all from North Carolina. After visiting with his family, Slawson read part of a Star Trek book titled ''Eugenics Wars,'' said Sterling Ivey, a spokesman for the state Department of Corrections. Ivey said Slawson appeared ''very relaxed, very focused,'' before his execution, and that the inmate told guards, ``I'm ready. It is time.''

Tampa Tribune

"Newton Slawson Executed For Deaths Of Tampa Family." (AP May 16, 2003)

STARKE - Newton Carlton Slawson, convicted of killing four members of a Tampa family and a fetus, was executed by injection Friday after a 13-hour delay while his mental competency was questioned. Slawson was pronounced dead at 7:10 a.m., officials said. The execution came 14 years after the killings and six years after he began the process to drop his court appeals.

Slawson, 48, was convicted in the April 11, 1989, shooting deaths of Gerald and Peggy Wood, who was 8 1/2 months pregnant, and their two young children, Glendon, 3, and Jennifer, 4. Slawson sliced Peggy Wood's body with a knife and pulled out her fetus, which had two gunshot wounds and multiple cuts, court records show. After the attack, Peggy Wood crawled down the stairs of their garage apartment, across a backyard to her mother's home and told her,'' Newton did it.'' She died in her mother's arms.

Slawson, who was given Valium before the injection, made no final statement. He was asked if he had anything to say and responded ``no.'' Six relatives of the victims, including Peggy Wood's brother, Ronald Ray Williams, watched the execution. ``He was convicted of cold-blooded murder and he should've died a long time ago,'' said Donna Burube, Gerald Wood's sister. ``I'm happy he's gone. I'm thrilled. I'm ecstatic.'' A small number of people stood outside the prison in protest of the execution. ``Executing the mentally ill is not going to stop crime,'' said Abe Bonowitz, director of Floridians for Alternatives to the death penalty.''

Just an hour before Slawson's scheduled execution Thursday, Gov. Jeb Bush issued a temporary stay so that three psychiatrists could examine whether Slawson was competent to be executed. Those psychiatrists reported to Bush around midnight and said they found Slawson aware of what the death sentence meant. The standard for competency is understanding that execution will result in death and why the sentence is being imposed. Bush lifted the stay early Friday morning, prison spokesman Sterling Ivey said. The stay came after Bush's office received a letter from Slawson's former attorneys, Craig Alldredge and Brian Donerly, who challenged the condemned man's sanity. The attorneys said Slawson was mentally ill at the time of the slayings and remains insane. Earlier this week, Donerly accused the state of ``helping the mentally ill commit suicide.''

Slawson, who dropped his appeals in 2001 and asked for execution, had eaten his last meal of scallops and Coca-Cola, read from a Star Trek novel and visited with family members for the final time when given news of the stay. He was visibly upset by the delay, Ivey said. ``He wanted the sentence to be carried out,'' Ivey said. At a court hearing in Tampa last month, Slawson told Circuit Judge Rex Barbas he wanted to be executed. ``Judge, let's just end this please,'' he said. After his meeting with the psychiatrists ended around 10 p.m. Thursday, Slawson went to sleep and slept through the night, Ivey said.

In his trial, prosecutors claimed Slawson had fantasies about dismembering women. When he was arrested, police found bloody clothing, a bloody knife, a .357 revolver with blood on it, an assault rifle, 180 rounds of ammunition and a Penthouse magazine in which had drawn images of slit bellies on some of the nude photographs. Defense attorneys argued that Gerald Wood had slipped crack cocaine into Slawson's beer, sending an unstable man into a killing rage. For the murders, Slawson received four death sentences, plus a 30-year sentence on a manslaughter conviction for the death of the fetus.

Since 1990, six of the 34 inmates executed have dropped their appeals. Four of the 11 executed since 2002, have volunteered for execution. Abe Bonowitz, director of Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, said Slawson and other death row inmates who have volunteered for execution are mentally ill. ``The only time the state will bend over backwards is when a prisoner wants to kill himself,'' Bonowitz said. ``We consider it an assisted suicide.'' Last fall, two inmates - serial killer Aileen Wuornos and triple murderer Rigoberto Sanchez-Velasco - were put to death after dropping their appeals. The judge also ordered mental exams for them in the days before their executions.

Slawson was the 56th person executed since Florida resumed executions in 1979 and the second to die this year. He was the 13th person executed under a death warrant signed by Bush.

Naples Daily News

"Tampa Killer Seeks Execution So State Can 'Go Stomp on Somebody Else,'" by Ron Word. (AP May 12, 2003)

STARKE — Newton Carlton Slawson, who killed four members of a Tampa family and a fetus, will likely die next week, becoming one of an increasing number of death row inmates who have dropped appeals and have volunteered for execution. Unless a court steps in and stops his execution, Slawson is scheduled to die Thursday evening at Florida State Prison near Starke. He did not file any appeals by a May 5 deadline imposed by a judge who ruled that Slawson was competent to decide whether to be executed, said Carolyn Snurkowski, an appeals attorney for Attorney General Charlie Crist. Slawson does not have an attorney.

Slawson was convicted in the April 11, 1989, shooting deaths of Gerald and Peggy Wood, who was 8 1/2 months pregnant, and their two young children, Glendon 3, and Jennifer, 4. Slawson sliced Peggy Wood's body with a knife and pulled out her fetus, which had two gunshot wounds and multiple lacerations, court records show. The slayings were the result of a drug deal that turned deadly. Gerald Wood offered to sell Slawson some crack cocaine, but Peggy Wood said she feared he might be a police officer. What happened next is unclear, but Slawson got his gun that he had hidden in the bathroom and opened fire on the family. Records also show Slawson said he thought Gerald Wood had placed drugs in his beer and that he felt he had been trapped in the house.

At a court hearing in Tampa in late April, Slawson, now 48, told Circuit Judge Rex Barbas he said planned to continue to seek execution. "Judge, let's just end this please," said Slawson, who dropped his appeals in 1997. In a September 1998 court hearing, he said, "I'm here to get a warrant signed and go to the electric chair and just be dead so that you can go stomp on somebody else."

On July 5, 2001, the Florida Supreme Court ruled that Slawson was competent and could drop his appeals. The high court also allowed Slawson to fire his state-appointed appeals lawyers. State attorneys have claimed and the courts have agreed that the condemned have a right to stop their appeals if they are competent to make those decisions. Those opposing the death penalty, however, argue that allowing the inmates to drop appeals is nothing more than allowing the state to help in their suicide.

Abe Bonowitz, director of Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, said Slawson and other death row inmates who have volunteered for execution are mentally ill and want to the state to kill them. "It's interesting to note that the only time the state will bend over backward is when a prisoner wants to kill himself," Bonowitz said. "We consider it an assisted suicide." Snurkowski said the governor's office doesn't target inmates who have dropped appeals, but looks at cases where there is no ongoing or remaining legal action.

Since 1990, six of the 34 inmates executed have dropped their appeals. Four of the 11 inmates executed since 2000 have volunteered for execution. Slawson would be the fifth. Last fall, two inmates — serial killer Aileen Wuornos and triple murderer Rigoberto Sanchez-Velasco — were put to death after dropping their appeals.

Sanchez-Velasco, 43, convicted in the Dec. 12, 1986 rape and murder of a girlfriend's daughter and the killing of two other death row inmates, was executed Oct. 2, and Wuornos, who confessed to killing six men, died a week later. While in prison, Sanchez-Velasco was convicted in the 1995 stabbing deaths of two other death row inmates, Edward B. "Mike" Kaprat III and Charles Street. He was given 15-year sentences for each of the slayings. In a court hearing, Sanchez-Velasco said, "I hate people. I don't like them. I want to kill people. You understand!"

Wuornos, 46, one of the nation's first known female serial killers, was convicted of fatally shooting six middle-aged men along the highways of north and central Florida in 1989 and 1990. Her story has been portrayed in two movies, three books and an opera. She had fired her state-appointed defense attorneys and asked that there be no "legal jabberwocky" in an attempt to get a stay of execution. "I'm one who seriously hates human life and would kill again," Wuornos wrote in a legal filing last June.

Since Florida reinstated its death penalty in 1976, four other inmates have dropped their appeals and have been executed. The first inmate who dropped his appeals was James Hamblen. He later changed his mind. He was executed Sept. 21, 1990, for the April 1984 shooting death of Laureen Jean Edwards during a robbery at a woman's lingerie shop in Jacksonville. Michael Alan Durocher, 33, died in Florida's electric chair on Aug. 25, 1993, for the murders of his infant son, his girlfriend and her young daughter in Clay County. Dan Patrick Hauser, 30, was executed by injection on Aug. 25, 2000, for the 1995 murder of Melanie Rodriques, a waitress and dancer in Destin. Four months later, Edward Castro was executed after dropping his appeals in the 1987 choking and stabbing death of 56-year-old Austin Carter Scott in Ocala.

Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty

Newton Slawson (FL) - May 15, 2003

The state of Florida is scheduled to grant a state-assisted suicide to Newton Slawson on May 15 in revenge for his murders of Gerald and Peggy Wood and their two young children, 4-year-old Jennifer and 3-year-old Glendon in Tampa in 1989. Slawson, a white man, testified at his trial that he believed he killed the family, but could not remember the incident. He suspected that Gerald, who was cutting a rock of cocaine while Slawson was in his home, drugged him before the killing spree began.

Slawson has dropped his appeals, yet serious questions remain concerning his mental stability and competency. Throughout the appeals process, he has never cooperated with his legal counsel, and has repeatedly refused to leave his prison cell for legal visits, medical appointments, and psychological evaluations.

Defense attorneys who have represented Slawson describe him as paranoid and delusional, and argue that the state should hold off his pending execution because of his mental illness. They claim he is incapable of trusting anyone, including his family members and attorneys.

As a child, Slawson suffered severe head injuries, and began having seizures, which would continue throughout his life. These factors, compounded with his tragic history of drug and alcohol abuse, have likely done little to help his mental stability. Despite Slawson's background, a Hillsborough District Judge found him competent to drop his appeals based on a 30-minute evaluation by a court-ordered psychiatrist.

The issue of mental competency is one of the most heated in the death penalty debate today. On Nov. 6, 2002, the U.S. Supreme Court granted a stay to James Colburn of Texas on the night of his scheduled execution to review his appeal concerning mental competency. The high court denied cert in that case, but the stay indicated a divide among the justices concerning Colburn's case.

Sadly, the state of Florida has a history of ignoring mental illness cases, as demonstrated by the execution of Linroy Bottoson on Dec. 9, 2002. Bottoson was diagnosed as a "latent schizophrenic" before his crime in 1979. Slawson's case is equally troubling, and the state should conduct more thorough evaluations of mental illness cases by independent and unbiased professionals before rushing to the execution chamber. Please contact Gov. Jeb Bush to request a commutation of Newton Slawson's sentence and a time-out on executions pending a thorough review of the state's death penalty system.

SENT BY: Abraham J. Bonowitz, Director
Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (FADP)

The Death House

"Slawson Found Sane, Executed in Florida for Murdering Tampa Family," by Robert Anthony Phillips. (May 16, 2003)

STARKE, Fla. - Newton Slawson, mad or sane, has had his death wish fullfilled. He was executed Friday morning. Slawson, who murdered a family of four in Tampa in 1989 and later fired his lawyers, waived his appeals and said he wanted to be executed, was put to death by lethal injection just after 7 a.m. at Florida State Prison. Slawson gave no last statement before the lethal injection began at 7:01 a.m. He was pronounced dead at 7:10 a.m., said Sterling Ivey, spokesman for the Florida Department of Corrections.

The execution came after Gov. Jeb Bush temporarily stayed Slawson's original Thursday execution time in order to have a team of three psychiatrists examine Slawson to determine whether he was competent. The psychiatrists met with Slawson at 10 p.m. Thursday night and later reported to Bush that Slawson was competent and knew he was going to be executed for the murders. When advised of the stay given to him by Bush shortly before his scheduled 6 p.m. Thursday execution, Slawson became upset, according to Ivey. "He was visibly upset by the news there was a stay," Ivey had said Thursday night. "He wants his sentence carried out." After meeting with the psychiatrists, Slawson went to sleep and awoke about an hour before his execution, Ivey said. Slawson did not have any breakfast, Ivey stated. Six relatives of the family Slawson murdered witnessed the execution. Slawson, who defense lawyers and anti-death penalty groups contended was mentally ill, murdered the family after he had gone to their home to buy crack cocaine. He also cut the unborn fetus from the body of the woman he killed. Bush had ordered the temporary stay Thursday after former lawyers for Slawson wrote a letter saying Slawson was mentally ill.

Victim Crawled To Revealed Killer

The victims were Gerald and Peggy Wood and their children, Jennifer, 4, and Glendon, 3. All were found shot to death in April 1989 in their Tampa home. Before dying, the mortally wounded Peggy Wood managed to crawl out of her apartment and tell a neighbor that Slawson had killed her husband and children. After shooting Peggy Wood, prosecutors said Slawson, 48, used a knife to slice open her stomach and remove the eight-month-old male fetus. Slawson said he did this in an attempt to "save" the child. However, an autopsy revealed that the fetus had been shot twice. Slawson was convicted of manslaughter for killing the unborn child.

Wanted To Die

At his trial, Slawson waived presentation of mitigating evidence to the jury that would recommend whether he lived or be sentenced to death. In 1998, he won the right to drop his appeals and dismiss his court-appointed lawyers. Slawson had been found competent to make that decision by the courts. Florida Supreme Court documents state that Slawson had gone to the Wood home carrying a knife and a .357 revolver. He was apparently going to buy rock cocaine. He later told police that he had placed the gun in the bathroom to keep it away from the children and gave the knife to Gerald Wood to cut the cocaine. When he refused to buy cocaine from Gerald Wood, Slawson claimed that Peggy Wood said he might be the police. Slawson said he went to the bathroom to pick up his gun and was going to leave. When he returned, Gerald Wood had a knife in his hand. It was then that Slawson claimed he shot Gerald Wood and "may have shot" Peggy Wood. Slawson then killed the children and later cut the fetus out of Peggy Wood’s body.

Incision Marks On Photos

Slawson also claimed that Wood might have put drugs in his beer. Other evidence linking Slawson to the murders was the fact that the murder weapon was found in his car, along with a magazine containing a picture of a nude woman with incision marks drawn on her body. Slawson would later say that he had been drawing pictures of mutilated bodies since he was 11 and that he had constant thoughts of disemboweling women.

Appeals lawyers who had represented Slawson said he was mentally ill and wouldn’t cooperate with him, refusing to leave his prison cell for legal visits, medical or psychological evaluations, according to court documents. The defense lawyers described Slawson as being so paranoid and delusional that "he is incapable of trusting his attorneys, family members or anyone else who may be considered a natural ally." The lawyers say that as a child, Slawson suffered numerous, severe head injuries, was oxygen deprived at birth and had a history of drug and alcohol abuse. He also had suffered seizures throughout his life, they said.

Slawson was the second condemned killer executed in Florida in 2003 and the 56th since the state resumed executions in 1979.

Fight the Death Penalty in the USA

Newton Carlton Slawson, 48, 2003-05-16, Florida

Newton Carlton Slawson, convicted of killing 4 members of a Tampa family and a fetus, was executed by injection Friday after a 13-hour delay while his mental competency was questioned. Slawson was pronounced dead at 7:10 a.m., officials said. The execution came 14 years after the killings and 6 years after he began the process to drop his court appeals.

Slawson, 48, was convicted in the April 11, 1989, shooting deaths of Gerald and Peggy Wood, who was 8 1/2 months pregnant, and their 2 young children, Glendon, 3, and Jennifer, 4. Slawson sliced Peggy Wood's body with a knife and pulled out her fetus, which had 2 gunshot wounds and multiple cuts, court records show. After the attack, Peggy Wood crawled down the stairs of their garage apartment, across a backyard to her mother's home and told her," Newton did it." She died in her mother's arms.

Just an hour before Slawson's scheduled execution Thursday, Gov. Jeb Bush issued a temporary stay so that 3 psychiatrists could examine whether Slawson was competent to be executed. Those psychiatrists reported to Bush around midnight and said they found Slawson aware of what the death sentence meant. The standard for competency is understanding that execution will result in death and why the sentence is being imposed. Bush lifted the stay early Friday morning, prison spokesman Sterling Ivey said. The stay came after Bush's office received a letter from Slawson's former attorneys, Craig Alldredge and Brian Donerly, who challenged the condemned man's sanity. The attorneys said Slawson was mentally ill at the time of the slayings and remains insane. Earlier this week, Donerly accused the state of "helping the mentally ill commit suicide."

Slawson, who dropped his appeals in 2001 and asked for execution, had eaten his last meal, read from a Star Trek novel and visited with family members for the final time when given news of the stay. He was visibly upset by the delay, Ivey said. "He wanted the sentence to be carried out," Ivey said. At a court hearing in Tampa last month, Slawson told Circuit Judge Rex Barbas he wanted to be executed. "Judge, let's just end this please," he said. After his meeting with the psychiatrists ended around 10 p.m. Thursday, Slawson went to sleep and slept through the night, Ivey said.

In his trial, prosecutors claimed Slawson had fantasies about dismembering women. When he was arrested, police found bloody clothing, a bloody knife, a .357 revolver with blood on it, an assault rifle, 180 rounds of ammunition and a Penthouse magazine in which had drawn images of slit bellies on some of the nude photographs. Defense attorneys argued that Gerald Wood had slipped crack cocaine into Slawson's beer, sending an unstable man into a killing rage. For the murders, Slawson received four death sentences, plus a 30-year sentence on a manslaughter conviction for the death of the fetus.

Since 1990, 6 of the 34 inmates executed have dropped their appeals. 4 of the 11 executed since 2002, have volunteered for execution. Abe Bonowitz, director of Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, said Slawson and other death row inmates who have volunteered for execution are mentally ill. "The only time the state will bend over backwards is when a prisoner wants to kill himself," Bonowitz said. "We consider it an assisted suicide."

Last fall, 2 inmates -- serial killer Aileen Wuornos and triple murderer Rigoberto Sanchez-Velasco -- were put to death after dropping their appeals. The judge also ordered mental exams for them in the days before their executions. Slawson becomes the 56th person executed since Florida resumed executions in 1979 and the 2nd to die this year. He was the 13th person executed under a death warrant signed by Bush.

(sources: Associated Press & Rick Halperin)

Newton Slawson v. State of Florida (State's Brief)

Defendant Slawson was charged with four counts of first degree murder and one count of killing an unborn child by injuring the mother in the deaths of Peggy Williams Wood, Gerald Wood, Jennifer Wood, and Glendon Wood (R. I/17-19).1 Slawson pled not guilty but was ultimately convicted as charged. Following the penalty phase of the trial, a jury recommended that the court impose four sentences of death (DA-R. 2144-47).

The judge followed the jury’s recommendation, finding prior violent felony convictions for each murder based on the contemporaneous killings and, as to the murder of Peggy Wood, finding the aggravating circumstance of heinous, atrocious or cruel (DA-R. 2157-60). In mitigation, the trial court found no significant history of criminal activity, substantial impairment of the capacity to conform conduct to the requirements of law, and murders committed under the influence of extreme mental or emotional disturbance; as well as nonstatutory mitigation of abuse as a child and the ability to act kindly and be friendly.

Slawson v. State, 619 So. 2d 255 (Fla. 1993) (Direct Appeal)

Defendant was convicted in the Circuit Court, Hillsborough County, Robert Bonnano, J., of four counts of first-degree murder and one count of killing unborn child by injuring mother, and was sentenced to death, and he appealed. The Supreme Court held that: (1) police did not violate defendant's rights under Edwards v. Arizona by advising him of his rights and insuring that he understood them, after he made equivocal request for counsel before being advised of his rights; (2) it was not fundamental error for state's expert witness to testify that in his opinion insanity and impairment defenses are "a charade"; (3) trial court properly considered evidence of circumstances of prior violent or capital felony in weighing aggravating factor for sentencing purposes; and (4) trial court properly found that aggravating circumstances outweighed mitigating circumstances. Affirmed.

PER CURIAM.
Newton Carlton Slawson appeals his convictions of four counts of first- degree murder and one count of killing an unborn child by injuring the mother and sentences, which include four death sentences. We have jurisdiction, article V, section 3(b)(1), Florida Constitution and affirm the convictions and sentences.

The following facts were developed at trial. On April 11, 1989, Peggy Williams Wood, her husband Gerald, and their two children, Jennifer, age four, and Glendon, age three, were murdered in their home. Also lost was the eight and one-half month fetus that Peggy Wood was carrying. At the time of the murders, the Wood family was living in a garage apartment next to Peggy Wood's parents' home in Hillsborough County. Around 10:00 p.m. on April 11, Peggy Wood was discovered lying on her parents' back porch. She had been shot twice, once in the abdomen and once in the back, and cut from the base of the sternum to the pelvic area. Her right thigh also had been cut several times. Still conscious, Peggy told her mother, "He killed Gerry and the kids." When asked "who," Peggy answered, "Newton did it. Newton killed Gerry and the kids." Peggy Wood died a short time later.

Gerald Wood and the two children were found dead upstairs in the couple's apartment. All three died as a result of gunshot wounds. Gerald Wood had been stabbed in the abdomen after dying from a gunshot wound to the back that entered the heart. At the foot of the couch where Gerald's body was found the body of the couple's unborn baby was discovered. The fetus had two gunshot wounds and several lacerations all of which were caused by the injuries to the mother.

Slawson was apprehended later that night. A .357 revolver, which was later determined to be the murder weapon, was found in his automobile. A magazine with incisions drawn on the abdominal area of nude women also was found. After his arrest, Slawson told detectives that he went to the Woods' residence on the day of the murders. He took a six inch knife and a .357 revolver. At Gerald's request, Slawson put the gun in the bathroom so the children would not get it. He gave the knife to Gerald Wood to use to cut rock cocaine. Gerald Wood offered to sell Slawson some of the cocaine but Slawson refused the offer. When Peggy said Slawson might be the police, Slawson went to the bathroom to get his gun so he could leave. When Slawson returned, Gerald Wood got up with the knife in his hand. According to his statement, Slawson shot Gerald and may have shot Peggy at that time. As Slawson proceeded to the children's bedroom and shot them, Peggy Wood was screaming. After shooting the children he returned to the living room and shot Peggy again. Slawson then inserted his knife into Peggy Wood's abdomen and cut upward, causing the fetus to be expelled.

Slawson testified at trial that he believed he killed the Wood family but did not remember doing it. He believed that Gerald Wood had put drugs in his beer, causing him to feel odd and to believe he was locked in the apartment. He remembered stabbing Gerald and standing in the kitchen with the gun in his hand. He remembered determining that Gerald and Peggy were dead and trying to save the baby by making the incision into Peggy's abdomen. According to his testimony, when Slawson determined that the baby was not going to survive, he left intending to commit suicide. However, he later returned to the scene to see if he had, in fact, killed the family and was arrested soon thereafter.

Slawson further testified about his "habit" of drawing incisions on pictures of nude women. He explained that he began drawing pictures of mutilated bodies when he was eleven years old. For years, Slawson had lived with a "mental quirk" causing him to continuously think about disemboweling women. While in the Navy, Slawson discussed his problem with a psychologist, who told him the practice of drawing was "a useful tool for actualizing his aggressive tendencies" without actually harming anyone. According to Slawson, the psychologist told him to continue to draw but not to identify the pictures with anyone and to destroy the magazines after he drew on the pictures.

Slawson was found guilty of four counts of first-degree murder and one count of killing an unborn child by injury to the mother. Slawson was sentenced to thirty years imprisonment for manslaughter of the unborn child. In accordance with the jury recommendation, Slawson was sentenced to death for each of the first-degree murders. The trial court found in aggravation as to each of the four murders that Slawson had been convicted of the three other capital felonies. As to the murder of Peggy Wood, the trial court found that the murder was especially heinous, atrocious or cruel. The trial court found the following statutory mitigating factors: 1) no significant history of criminal activity, although from Slawson's admissions and statements to mental health experts Slawson used illegal drugs habitually for years; 2) in the opinion of a defense expert, Slawson's capacity to conform his conduct to the requirements of law was substantially impaired; and 3) in the opinion of a defense expert, the murders were committed while Slawson was under the influence of extreme mental or emotional disturbance. As nonstatutory mitigating factors the court found that Slawson was abused as a child and he was capable of acts of kindness and could be a friendly person. Slawson appeals both his convictions and sentences.

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Accordingly, the convictions and sentences of death are affirmed. It is so ordered.