06 June 2018 :

After spending nearly 11 years on death row, Steven Hayward (49, Black) was sentenced to life in prison without parole. Hayward was sentenced to death in St. Lucie County on June 1, 2007 for robbing and shooting Daniel DeStefano, a 32-year-old newspaper carrier. DeStefano was shot in the chest and thigh as he delivered newspapers to convenience stores about 4 a.m. Feb. 1, 2005. The state's newest death penalty law, enacted in March 2017, requires a jury to reach 12-0 vote to recommend death. Rulings by the U.S. Supreme Court and the Florida Supreme Court retroactively invalidated death sentences that followed less-than-unanimous jury recommendations. It applies to those whose direct appeals were finalized after June 24, 2002. Hayward's jury voted 8-4 for death in the sentencing phase. Though prosecutors initially filed a notice of intent to seek the death penalty again for Hayward, Chief Assistant State Attorney Tom Bakkedahl said in January he would instead abide by the family's wishes to not to go through another death penalty hearing. Bakkedahl said even if a new jury voted unanimously for the death penalty, that merely is the 1st step in a 15-year process of appeals. "The family couldn’t quite go through the process again, and I didn't have the heart to force them," Bakkedahl said. With all appeals resolved, Hayward was given the life sentence on May 16 by Circuit Judge James McCann, who had issued the original death sentence in 2007.