TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - In what could be Florida’s 17th execution this year, Gov. Ron DeSantis on Tuesday signed a death warrant for a man convicted of raping and murdering a Putnam County convenience-store manager in 1988.

Richard Barry Randolph, 63, is scheduled to be executed Nov. 20 for the murder of Minnie Ruth McCollum, who was beaten, stabbed and raped at a Handy Way store in East Palatka.

The backstory:

Randolph was a former employee of the store, and McCollum interrupted him as he tried to steal money or lottery tickets, according to a 1989 sentencing order issued by then-Circuit Judge Robert Perry.

"When Minnie Ruth McCollum interrupted the defendant in the process of stealing from the store, he brutally beat her about the head with his hands and fists, kicked her, strangle

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