Wade Wilson, the Fort Myers, Florida man convicted of killing two Cape Coral women in 2019, was sentenced to death Tuesday.
A jury found Wilson, 30, guilty on June 12 of the murders of Kristine Melton, 35, and Diane Ruiz, 43, and after weighing aggravating and mitigating circumstances recommended the death penalty.
Judge Nicholas Thompson agreed with the jury’s recommendation and imposed two death sentences on Wilson, one for each murder.
Wilson’s legal team had filed a motion on July 3 asking for a new trial or acquittal on the murder and several other charges. Thompson denied the motion on August 15.
Sentencing was initially scheduled for July 23 but a defense motion for a delay over scheduling conflicts for expert witnesses was granted and sentencing delayed.
Here’s what to know about Wade Wilson’s crimes, trial and what happens next:
Wade Wilson crimes
Wilson, then 25, met Kristine Melton, 35, and her friend Stephanie Sailors on Oct. 7, 2019, at Buddah LIVE, a Fort Myers bar.
After the bar closed, Wilson and the two women went to the home of Jayson Shepard where they stayed for several hours before leaving in the morning.
Wilson, Melton and Sailors then went Melton’s Cape Coral home. After Sailors left, Wilson strangled Melton to death as she slept in her bed and stole her car.
A short time later, Wilson saw 43-year-old Diane Ruiz walking along a Cape Coral street, asked her for directions to a nearby school and lured her into the car.
When Ruiz tried to exit the car, Wilson attacked her, beating and strangling her before pushing her out of the car and running her over 10 to 20 times.
After the murders, Wilson called his biological father Steven Testasecca several times confessing to and narrating the gruesome details of his crimes.
After initially dismissing the calls and attributing the admissions to Wilson being a “good storyteller,” Testasecca, 46, put his phone on speaker with Wilson’s biological mother listening in and relaying information to police.
Testasecca asked Wilson for his location and told him he would send an Uber to him. Instead, his whereabouts were provided to police who arrested Wilson on Oct. 8, 2019.
Wade Wilson victims Kristine Melton and Diane Ruiz
Kristine Melton grew up in Illinois and moved with a friend to Cape Coral where she worked as a waitress.
She reportedly was godmother to her cousin Samantha Catomer’s child, owned a cat and lived in a Cape Coral duplex.
Melton loved to dress up and her favorite holiday was Halloween, Catomer testified during Wilson’s trial.
Melton had a quick wit, made everyone around her feel safe and understood and “was precious, not just to me, but to everyone who knew her,” Catomer said.
Melton was 35 years old when she met Wilson at Buddah LIVE, a Fort Myers bar. After leaving the bar and spending several hours at the home of Jayson Shepard, Melton, Sailors and Wilson went to Melton’s duplex.
After Sailors left, Wilson strangled her to death in her sleep.
Diane Ruiz, 43, a mother and engaged to be married, was described as caring and hardworking.
She worked as a bartender at the Moose Lodge in Cape Coral and never missed a shift in five years.
Ruiz was walking to work for her 10 a.m. shift when she encountered Wilson.
A short time after killing Melton, Wilson saw Ruiz walking along a Cape Coral street and lured her into the car after asking her for directions.
When she tried to leave, Wilson beat and strangled Ruiz, pushed her out of the car and ran her over repeatedly.
Her body was found in a field three days later.
What was Wade Wilson convicted of?
Wilson was tried and found guilty of six charges:
Wilson also faces charges in unrelated crimes, including attempted escape from jail and drug charges.
Wade Wilson tied to white supremacy prison gang Unforgiven
Court records in the attempted escape case connect Wilson to the Unforgiven, a white supremacy prison gang.
Wilson sports several swastika tattoos, including on the right side of his head and below his right eye.
The swastika was adopted in 1920 as the symbol of Adolf Hitler’s Nazi party, and since 1945 has “served as the most significant and notorious of hate symbols, anti-Semitism and white supremacy,” according to the Anti-Defamation League.
According to the Anti-Defamation League, the Unforgiven gang was founded in the Florida prison system in 1986 and is the largest white supremacist prison gang in the state.
Wade Wilson gets death sentence
On June 25, 2024, the jury in Wilson’s trial recommended he receive the death penalty for each of the murders.
During the penalty phase of the trial, jurors had the option of recommending life in prison without parole or death.
Florida juries were required to vote unanimously for a death sentence recommendation until April 2023 when Gov. Ron DeSantis lowered the threshold by signing into law a bill allowing juries to recommend death with as few as 8 votes.
After considering aggravating and mitigating circumstances, the jury voted for death – 9-3 in Melton’s murder and 10-2 in Ruiz’s murder.
On Tuesday, August 27, 2024, Judge Thompson imposed a death sentence for each of the murders.
Where is Wade Wilson being held now?
Wilson is being held at the Lee County Jail in Fort Myers, Florida. Once unrelated charges, including the escape attempt, are resolved, he’ll be transferred into the Florida prison system.
Inmates under death sentences are housed on Florida’s death row at Union Correctional Institution.
Where is Florida’s death row, Union Correctional Institution?
Florida’s death row is inside Union Correctional Institution in Raiford, about 45 miles southwest of Jacksonville.
What is life like on Florida’s death row?
According to the Florida Department of Corrections, inmates on death row are allowed snacks, radios and 13” TVs, but do not have cable or air-conditioning.
They wear orange T-shirts to set them apart from other inmates and the same blue pants worn by regular prisoners.
Death row inmates are served three meals a day – at 5 a.m., from 10:30 to 11 a.m. and from 4 to 4:30 p.m.. Food is prepared by prison staff and transported in insulated carts to the cells, where inmates are given sporks to eat from the provided trays.
They’re allowed showers every other day.
Any visitors must be preapproved and inmates can receive mail every day except holidays and weekends.
Inmates are not allowed to be with each other in a common room.
Death Row inmates are counted at least hourly. They wear handcuffs everywhere except in their cells, the exercise yard and shower. They are in their cells except for medical reasons, exercise, social or legal visits or media interviews.
A Death Watch cell is 12x7x8.5 feet high.
Once a death warrant is signed by the governor, the inmate is put in a Death Watch cell and allowed a legal and social phone call.
Does Florida still use the electric chair? What are the methods of execution?
In 1923, the Legislature passed a law replacing hanging with the electric chair. An oak chair was built by prison inmates that year.
Florida’s current three-legged electric chair, nicknamed “Old Sparky,” was built of oak by Florida Department of Corrections staff and installed at Florida State Prison in 1999.
Legislation passed in 2000 allows for lethal injection as an alternative to the electric chair. The person under sentence of death has one opportunity to elect electrocution. The election must be made in writing and delivered to the prison’s warden.
Contributing: Tomas Rodriguez, Fort Myers News-Press
This article originally appeared on Fort Myers News-Press: Wade Wilson: Florida killer gets 2 death sentences. What’s next?
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