And it was for killing an FWC officer
I'm glad justice is being served, but why in the hell 26 years on death row????
Grossman, of Pasco County, was 19 when he killed Park as she tried to arrest him and 17-year-old Thayne Nathan Taylor in what is now the Brooker Creek Preserve in Tarpon Springs.
Grossman has spent the latter half of his life in prison for the murder. He is scheduled to die at 6 p.m., the first Florida execution of 2010 and the 69th since the death penalty was restored in 1976.
Park, a Florida Game and Fresh Water Fish Commission officer, found a stolen Luger pistol in the van Grossman and Taylor were in and tried to report it.
But Grossman, fearing that the offense would violate his probation and land him back in prison, attacked the officer with her own flashlight as she used her radio.
"I'm hit," Park yelled over the radio.
Grossman called for Taylor to help him subdue the officer. Park managed to draw her .357 Magnum and fire off a wild shot inside her patrol vehicle. Then she kicked Taylor in the groin.
But Grossman, 6 feet 4 and 225 pounds, overpowered the 5-foot-5, 115-pound officer. He broke her fingers wrenching the .357 away from Park and shot her in the back of the head.
The two men escaped but were arrested 11 days later. Grossman was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death a year to the day of the murder. Taylor was convicted of third-degree murder and served two years of his seven-year sentence.
Park grew up in Columbus, Ohio, and quickly developed an affinity for the outdoors. She camped with park rangers in Ontario and especially enjoyed the sounds of wolves howling.
She graduated from Ohio State University and came to Florida to become a wildlife officer. She quickly took to the law enforcement side of her new post, though it often required her to patrol alone.
"I decided when I was 12 that I wanted to be a park ranger," she told the St. Petersburg Times in an interview before her death. "It will never be a job."
After her service, Park's ashes were scattered by helicopter over the eagles' nests she helped care for as a wildlife officer.
In 2007, a stone marker was placed in John Chesnut Park in Palm Harbor to honor "an officer fallen in the cause of conservation."
Park's brother, sister and mother, Peggy, 79, planned to attend the execution. The mother came from Ohio despite a cardiologist's order not to trav
it is a dangerous job. Remember an FWC officer is walking up to you will ruin your day if you dont have your stuff straight. Its more dangerous then a cop cause a cop is walking up to you or your car and 99.9 percent of the time the person does not have a gun. When a FWC officer walks up to a hunter 99.9 percent of the time THEY DO have a gun, and 99.9 percent of the time ITS LOADED.
Let him fry! Cant believe the other guy only served two years.
He's dead
