The U.S. is set to reach a 10-year high for executions next week, with Florida expected to administer a lethal injection to Michael Bernard Bell for the revenge killing of two people in 1993.
Bell is set to be executed on Tuesday, July 15, for murdering 23-year-old Jimmy West and 18-year-old Tamecka Smith outside a Jacksonville bar on Dec. 9, 1993, when he went on a rampage with an AK-47.
Should the execution move forward as expected, Bell will be the 26th inmate executed in the U.S. this year, eclipsing the 25 executions conducted in the nation during all of last year. It will also be the most executions in any given year in the U.S. since all of 2015, when there were 28. Another nine executions are scheduled for later this year…