FLORIDA EXECUTION: In a brief statement before his death, Chadwick Willacy urged his “brothers on the row” to stay strong, and maintained his innocence, saying he would never kill his friend….see more

Chadwick Scott Willacy, convicted of first-degree murder for setting his elderly neighbor on fire after she allegedly caught him burglarizing her home, maintained his innocence right before being executed by the State of florida on Tuesday.

“To the victim’s family, I hope this brings you peace. If it does, that’s good,” Willacy said, according to The Associated Press. “But this is not right.”

The state pronounced the 58-year-old dead at 6:15 p.m. after administering him a three-drug lethal injection at Florida State Prison.On Sept. 5, 1990, Sather had returned from work to find Willacy, her next-door neighbor, burglarizing her Palm Bay home.

Willacy then bludgeoned her head, tied her hands and feet with wire and duct tape, and “choked and strangled her with a cord with a force so intense that a portion of her skull was dislodged,” according to court documents.