Florida Mann, who killed grandmother, asks the 8-year-old to stay executed

A Florida occupant on Monday asked the US Court of Justice to keep its execution for Thursday.

The 63-year-old Edward James remained guilty of murdering a woman and raping and killing her 8-year-old granddaughter in Seminole County in 1993.

The appeals to delay his fatal injection were rejected by the Supreme Court of Florida and a federal court of appeal.

In the appeals, James' lawyer quoted a “cognitive decline” and whether the execution of the constitutional prohibition of the cruel and unusual punishment would violate.

“The problems available in the present case require the appeal test, which is not cut off by the requirements of an impending execution,” wrote James lawyer Dawn MacReady.

James' execution is planned in Stark on Thursday at 6 p.m. in the Florida State Prison.

James said he attacked 8-year-old Toni Neuner, who lived in the house of her grandmother Betty Dick before murdering the 58-year-old wife. James had rented a room in Dick's house.

According to court files, James raped the child before he threw her body through the room, causing internal injuries, and then killed it by strangulation. James then went into Dick's bedroom and stabbed her more than 20 times with two knives, as recordings.

Governor Ron Desantis signed the death sentence of James' death on February 1.

The execution would be the second of the state this year. James Dennis Ford was killed in Charlotte County in 1997 for murder. Another inmate, Michael Tanzi, 48, is the schedule for the kidnapping and murder of a woman from Miami.