Supreme Court of Florida

_____________

No. SC2023-0531

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DARRYL B. BARWICK,

Appellant,

vs.

STATE OF FLORIDA,

Appellee.

April 28, 2023

PER CURIAM.

Darryl B. Barwick, a prisoner under sentence of death for 

whom a warrant has been signed and an execution set for May 3, 

2023, appeals the circuit court’s orders summarily denying his

second successive motion for postconviction relief, which was filed 

under Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.851; denying his motion 

for a stay of execution; and sustaining objections to his public 

records requests, which were made under rule 3.852. We have 

jurisdiction. See art. V, § 3(b)(1), Fla. Const. For the reasons that 

follow, we affirm.
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I. BACKGROUND

On March 31, 1986, after observing the victim sunbathing at 

her Panama City apartment complex, Barwick returned to his home

to retrieve a knife and walked back to the apartment complex. He

followed the victim into her apartment, stabbed her thirty-seven 

times, wrapped her in a comforter, and left her body in the 

bathroom for her sister to find when she returned to their shared 

apartment that evening. Bloody fingerprints were found on the 

victim’s purse and wallet, and her bathing suit had been displaced. 

Semen was found on the comforter wrapped around her body, and 

it was determined that Barwick was included within the two percent 

of the population who could have left the stain. Barwick was 

arrested and confessed to law enforcement and multiple family 

members. Barwick v. State, 660 So. 2d 685, 688-89 (Fla. 1995). 

Barwick was indicted on charges of first-degree murder, armed 

burglary, attempted sexual battery, and armed robbery. He was 

initially found guilty as charged and subsequently sentenced to 

death for the murder in 1987, but the convictions and sentences 
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were vacated due to a Neil violation during jury selection.1 Id. at 

689. At his retrial in 1992, the jury again found Barwick guilty as 

charged and unanimously recommended a sentence of death. The 

trial court found that the following aggravators had been 

established beyond a reasonable doubt: (1) previous convictions for 

the violent felonies of sexual battery with force likely to cause death 

or great bodily harm and burglary of a dwelling with an assault; (2) 

the murder was committed during an attempted sexual battery; (3) 

the murder was committed to avoid arrest; (4) the murder was 

committed for pecuniary gain; (5) the murder was especially 

heinous, atrocious, or cruel; and (6) the murder was committed in a 

cold, calculated, and premeditated manner without any pretense of 

moral justification. The trial court found that each potential 

mitigator proposed by Barwick was either not established by the 

1. Barwick had objected to the State’s use of peremptory 

challenges to excuse three black jurors, and the trial court 

incorrectly believed that Barwick had no standing to make an 

objection under State v. Neil, 457 So. 2d 481 (Fla. 1984)—which 

prohibits the use of peremptory challenges on prospective jurors

based solely on their race—due to the fact that both he and the 

victim were white. See Barwick v. State, 547 So. 2d 612, 612 (Fla. 

1989).
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evidence or was not a significant mitigating circumstance. The trial 

court followed the jury’s recommendation of a sentence of death for 

the murder and also sentenced Barwick to life for armed burglary 

with a battery, thirty years for attempted sexual battery, and life for 

armed robbery. Id. at 689-90.

On appeal after retrial, this Court concluded that although the 

trial court erred in applying the cold, calculated, and premeditated 

aggravator, the error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt, and 

Barwick’s convictions and sentences were affirmed. Id. at 696-97. 

The convictions and sentences became final when the United States 

Supreme Court denied certiorari in 1996. Barwick v. Florida, 516 

U.S. 1097 (1996).

In the decades since, Barwick has unsuccessfully challenged 

his convictions and sentences in state and federal court. See

Barwick v. State, 88 So. 3d 85 (Fla. 2011) (affirming the denial of 

Barwick’s initial motion for postconviction relief and denying his 

state habeas petition); Barwick v. Crews, 5:12cv00159-RH, 2014 

WL 1057088 (N.D. Fla. Mar. 19, 2014) (denying Barwick’s federal 

habeas petition); Barwick v. Sec’y, Fla. Dept. of Corr., 794 F.3d 1239

(11th Cir. 2015) (affirming the denial of Barwick’s federal habeas 
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petition); Barwick v. State, 237 So. 3d 927 (Fla. 2018) (affirming the 

denial of Barwick’s first successive motion for postconviction relief).

Governor Ron DeSantis signed Barwick’s death warrant on 

April 3, 2023. Barwick then filed a second successive motion for 

postconviction relief under rule 3.851, raising three claims: (1) the 

scheduling of Barwick’s execution and warrant litigation violates his 

right to due process under the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments 

to the United States Constitution and the corresponding provisions 

of the Florida Constitution and deprives him of the effective

assistance of postconviction counsel; (2) newly discovered evidence 

shows that the death penalty is a categorically unconstitutional 

punishment for individuals who were under age twenty-one when 

they committed their capital offenses; and (3) because of his severe 

neuropsychological disorder, lifelong cognitive impairments, and 

low mental age, executing Barwick would violate the Eighth and 

Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution. The 

circuit court summarily denied all three claims, as well as Barwick’s 

motion for a stay and certain requests for public records. This 

appeal followed.
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II. ANALYSIS

A. Due Process, Effective Assistance of Postconviction 

Counsel, Stay of Execution, and Public Records

In his first issue on appeal, Barwick claims primarily that the 

compressed warrant litigation schedule resulted in the denial of his 

rights to due process and the effective assistance of postconviction 

counsel. He addresses these claims as a single issue, asserting that 

due process depends on the effective assistance of counsel, and that 

the accelerated warrant schedule and other attendant 

circumstances made it impossible for Barwick to be provided with 

effective assistance of postconviction counsel. 

The circuit court summarily denied this consolidated claim,

finding that Barwick was not denied due process because he did not 

allege that he was ever denied notice or an opportunity to be heard

and that he was not denied effective assistance of postconviction 

counsel because he has no right to effective assistance of 

postconviction counsel. We agree that summary denial of this claim 

was proper.

Barwick has made it abundantly clear in his pleadings filed in 

both the circuit court and this Court that the post-warrant litigation 
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in this case has been very arduous for his counsel due to certain 

circumstances that happened to coincide with the beginning of the 

warrant period, such as the occurrence of Holy Week, Passover, and 

Ramadan; co-counsel being ill; and the presence of another inmate 

on Death Watch.2 Indeed, post-warrant litigation is arduous, even

without such circumstances. Yet none of the obstacles identified by 

Barwick resulted in a denial of due process.

The Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the 

United States Constitution provides that no state shall “deprive any 

person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.” U.S. 

Const. amend. XIV. The Florida Constitution similarly provides 

that “[n]o person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without 

due process of law.” Art. I, § 9, Fla. Const. “Due process requires 

that a defendant be given notice and an opportunity to be heard on 

a matter before it is decided.” Asay v. State, 210 So. 3d 1, 27 (Fla. 

2016) (citing Huff v. State, 622 So. 2d 982, 982 (Fla. 1993)). But as 

the circuit court recognized in summarily denying this claim, 

2. “Death Watch” is a designated area of Florida State Prison 

where death row inmates under an active death warrant are 

housed.
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Barwick has not identified any matter on which he was denied 

notice or an opportunity to be heard before it was decided. We have 

previously denied a due process claim raised in the death warrant 

context on this basis. See id. at 27-28 (rejecting due process claim 

where capital defendant under a death warrant failed to state when 

he was denied notice or an opportunity to be heard at any stage of 

his postconviction proceedings). Because Barwick has failed to 

state when he was denied notice or an opportunity to be heard, his 

due process claim fails.

Barwick also alleges that the thirty-day warrant period and the 

difficult attendant circumstances identified by Barwick made it 

impossible for postconviction counsel to provide effective

assistance, thereby violating what he claims is his “statutory right 

to effective postconviction counsel.” Under Florida law, individuals 

sentenced to death are entitled to the appointment of capital 

postconviction counsel for the purpose of pursuing any collateral 

attacks on their convictions and sentences. See § 27.702(1), Fla. 

Stat. (2022) (“The capital collateral regional counsel shall represent 

each person convicted and sentenced to death in this state for the 

sole purpose of instituting and prosecuting collateral actions 
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challenging the legality of the judgment and sentence imposed . . . 

.”). Barwick argues that along with the entitlement to counsel,

section 27.711(12), Florida Statutes (2022), establishes a “statutory 

right to effective postconviction counsel.” 

Section 27.711(12) provides: 

The court shall monitor the performance of assigned 

counsel to ensure that the capital defendant is receiving 

quality representation. The court shall also receive and 

evaluate allegations that are made regarding the 

performance of assigned counsel. The Justice 

Administrative Commission, the Department of Legal 

Affairs, or any interested person may advise the court of 

any circumstance that could affect the quality of 

representation, including, but not limited to, false or 

fraudulent billing, misconduct, failure to meet continuing 

legal education requirements, solicitation to receive 

compensation from the capital defendant, or failure to file 

appropriate motions in a timely manner.

§ 27.711(12), Fla. Stat. But Barwick ignores other provisions within 

chapter 27 that make it clear that the “quality representation” 

referenced in section 27.711(12) does not create a right to effective 

assistance of postconviction counsel. Section 27.711(10) plainly 

states that “[a]n action taken by an attorney who represents a 

capital defendant in postconviction capital collateral proceedings 

may not be the basis for a claim of ineffective assistance of 

counsel.” § 27.711(10), Fla. Stat. (2022). Section 27.7002(1) states 
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that capital defendants may not “challenge in any form or manner 

the adequacy of the collateral representation provided,” and section 

27.7002(2) provides that the “sole method of assuring adequacy of 

representation provided shall be in accordance with the provisions 

of s[ection] 27.711(12),” i.e., court monitoring. §§ 27.7002(1), (2), 

Fla. Stat. (2022). The fact that these provisions of chapter 27 

expressly prohibit capital defendants from raising claims of 

ineffective assistance of postconviction counsel or otherwise 

challenging the adequacy of their postconviction representation 

forecloses any argument that section 27.711(12) creates a right to 

effective postconviction counsel.

Despite the plain language of these statutes, Barwick argues 

that this Court recognized the right to effective assistance of capital 

postconviction counsel when it stated in Spalding v. Dugger, 526 

So. 2d 71, 72 (Fla. 1988), that “under section 27.702, each 

defendant under sentence of death is entitled, as a statutory right, 

to effective legal representation by the capital collateral 

representative in all collateral relief proceedings.” But in Asay, we 

clarified that “Spalding only requires that a defendant be 

represented by an attorney during postconviction proceedings.” 
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210 So. 3d at 28. And none of the cases cited by Barwick in 

support of what he claims to be Spalding’s “holding” compel a 

different conclusion. 

We have also specifically held that “[u]nder Florida and federal 

law, a defendant has no constitutional right to effective collateral 

counsel.” Zack v. State, 911 So. 2d 1190, 1203 (Fla. 2005). 

Further, the United States Supreme Court has “refused to extend a 

due process requirement for effective collateral counsel to situations 

where a state, like Florida, has opted to afford collateral counsel to 

indigent inmates.” Id. (citing Pennsylvania v. Finley, 481 U.S. 551 

(1987)). Thus, a claim of ineffective assistance of postconviction 

counsel does not provide a valid basis for relief. 

Within this first issue on appeal, Barwick also challenges the 

circuit court’s denial of his motion for a stay of execution. We agree 

with the circuit court that Barwick did not establish any substantial 

grounds upon which relief might be granted if a stay had been 

ordered. As a result, his motion was properly denied. See Dillbeck 

v. State, 357 So. 3d 94, 103 (Fla.) (“ ‘[A] stay of execution on a 

successive motion for postconviction relief is warranted only where 

there are substantial grounds upon which relief might be granted.’
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”) (quoting Davis v. State, 142 So. 3d 867, 873-74 (Fla. 2014)), cert. 

denied, 143 S. Ct. 856 (2023).

Finally, to the extent that Barwick has also raised a claim that 

the circuit court erred in denying his access to certain public 

records under rule 3.852(h)(3), it is insufficiently pleaded because 

he has not identified which updated records he was denied. Thus, 

Barwick is not entitled to relief regarding his public records 

requests. See Heath v. State, 3 So. 3d 1017, 1029 n.8 (Fla. 2009)

(“Vague and conclusory allegations on appeal are insufficient to 

warrant relief.”).

After consideration of each of the arguments raised in this 

issue, we find no error in the circuit court’s summary denial of

Claim 1 of Barwick’s second successive motion for postconviction 

relief.

B. Newly Discovered Evidence/Extension of Roper

In his second issue on appeal, Barwick argues that the circuit

court erred in denying Claim 2 of his second successive

postconviction motion, in which he argued that he is categorically 

exempt from execution because he was under the age of twenty-one 

when he committed his capital offense. Barwick asserts that 
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“[n]ewly discovered evidence of a definitive consensus regarding 

adolescent brain development demonstrates that the death penalty 

is a categorically unconstitutional punishment for individuals who 

committed their offenses when they were between the ages of 18 to 

21.” At its core, this is a claim that Roper v. Simmons, 543 U.S. 

551, 578 (2005)—which held that “[t]he Eighth and Fourteenth 

Amendments forbid imposition of the death penalty on offenders 

who were under the age of 18 when their crimes were committed”—

should be extended to individuals who were under the age of 

twenty-one at the time their capital offenses were committed. 

The “definitive consensus” to which Barwick refers is reflected 

in an August 2022 “resolution” from the American Psychological 

Association (APA).3 In short, the resolution states that “based upon 

the rationale of the Roper decision and currently available science, 

APA concludes the same prohibitions that have been applied to 

application of the penalty of death for persons who commit a 

serious crime at ages 17 and younger should apply to persons ages 

3. APA RESOLUTION on the Imposition of Death as a Penalty 

for Persons Aged 18 Through 20, Also Known As the Late Adolescent 

Class, American Psychological Association (August 2022), 

https://www.apa.org/about/policy/resolution-death-penalty.pdf.
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18 through 20,” because “there is no neuroscientific bright line 

regarding brain development that indicates the brains of 18- to 20-

year-olds differ in any substantive way from those of 17-year-olds.” 

The circuit court summarily denied this claim as procedurally 

barred, untimely, and without merit.

The circuit court was correct in concluding that this claim is 

procedurally barred because it is a variation of claims that were 

raised in prior proceedings. In Claim 22 of his initial postconviction 

proceedings, Barwick argued that because he suffers from brain 

damage and a mental and emotional age of less than eighteen 

years, his execution would offend the evolving standards of decency, 

serve no legitimate penological goal, and violate the Eighth and 

Fourteenth Amendments under Roper. He argued that his 

“neuropsychological impairments and his youth warrant 

consideration” and that he “lacks the requisite ‘highly culpable 

mental state’ ” for capital punishment. In denying relief, the 

postconviction court recognized this claim as a Roper-extension 

claim and declined to “extend the holding in Roper.” 

Similarly, in Argument 1 of his petition for a writ of habeas 

corpus, filed in this Court in 2008, Barwick argued that due to his 
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brain damage, mental impairment, and mental and emotional age of 

less than eighteen years, his execution would offend the evolving 

standards of decency of a civilized society, serve no legitimate 

penological goal, and violate the Eighth and Fourteenth 

Amendments under Roper. He further argued that capital 

punishment should not be imposed where a defendant, like himself, 

lacks the requisite “highly culpable mental state.” See Barwick, 88 

So. 3d at 106 (rejecting habeas claim that because Barwick’s

mental age is less than eighteen due to brain damage and mental 

capacity, his execution is unconstitutional under Roper).

These initial postconviction and state habeas claims both 

asserted that although Barwick was nineteen when he committed 

the murder, Roper’s categorical ban on executing juveniles should 

be extended to him because he had a “mental and emotional age of 

less than eighteen years” at the time of the murder. The argument 

at the core of the instant claim is similarly that the mental and 

emotional age of eighteen- to twenty-year-olds cannot be 

distinguished reliably from that of sixteen- to seventeen-year-olds, 

and Roper should therefore extend to individuals who, like Barwick, 
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were eighteen to twenty years old when they committed their capital 

murders. 

There is no doubt that Barwick is attempting to relitigate the 

same issue—that Roper should extend to him—that he has raised in 

two prior proceedings, now disguised as a claim of newly discovered 

evidence. Barwick acknowledges in his second successive motion

that he previously “has raised the factual basis of [this] claim.” 

Barwick is admittedly using “a different argument to relitigate the 

same issue,” which is inappropriate. Medina v. State, 573 So. 2d 

293, 295 (Fla. 1990). The circuit court was correct in denying this

claim as procedurally barred because versions of it were raised in 

prior proceedings.

The circuit court also denied this claim as untimely because 

the APA resolution does not constitute newly discovered evidence 

such that it creates an exception to the one-year time limitation for 

filing postconviction claims. See Fla. R. Crim. P. 3.851(d)(1) 

(requiring that “[a]ny motion to vacate judgment of conviction and 

sentence of death shall be filed by the defendant within 1 year after 

the judgment and sentence become final”); Fla. R. Crim. P. 

3.851(d)(2)(A) (creating an exception to the one-year time limitation 
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if “the facts on which the claim is predicated were unknown to the 

movant or the movant’s attorney and could not have been 

ascertained by the exercise of due diligence”).

The APA resolution appears to be the association’s official or 

public stance that the death penalty should be banned in cases 

where the offender was under twenty-one years of age at the time of 

the capital offense. The resolution cites approximately fifty sources 

in support of this position, including articles published in 

psychology journals, law reviews, by universities, and by at least 

one of each of the following: a “nonprofit think tank,” a “research 

and advocacy center,” a federal agency, and a news outlet. It also 

cites reports, books, online registries, and meta-analyses. Thus, it 

is fair to say that the APA’s resolution is based on a compilation of 

studies, research, data, and reports, published between 1992 and 

2022 and relying on data from as early as 1977, and therefore does 

not constitute newly discovered evidence under rule 3.851(d)(2)(A). 

This Court has routinely held that resolutions, consensus 

opinions, articles, research, and the like, do not constitute newly 

discovered evidence. See, e.g., Foster v. State, 258 So. 3d 1248, 

1253 (Fla. 2018) (rejecting as untimely an extension-of-Roper claim 
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relying on scientific research and a 2018 American Bar Association 

(ABA) resolution recommending individuals under twenty-two be 

exempt from execution, because they do not qualify as newly 

discovered evidence); Branch v. State, 236 So. 3d 981, 984-87 (Fla. 

2018) (rejecting as untimely an extension-of-Roper claim that relied 

on new scientific research, scientific consensus, international 

consensus, and the 2018 ABA resolution, because they do not 

qualify as newly discovered evidence); Schwab v. State, 969 So. 2d 

318, 325 (Fla. 2007) (holding that “new opinions” and “research 

studies” are not newly discovered evidence); Rutherford v. State, 940 

So. 2d 1112, 1117 (Fla. 2006) (holding that a 2006 ABA report was 

not newly discovered evidence because it was “a compilation of 

previously available information”). Because the August 2022 APA 

resolution does not qualify as newly discovered evidence, this claim 

was properly summarily denied as untimely.

This claim is also without merit because this Court lacks the 

authority to extend Roper. The conformity clause of article I, 

section 17 of the Florida Constitution provides that “[t]he 

prohibition against cruel or unusual punishment, and the 

prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment, shall be 
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construed in conformity with decisions of the United States 

Supreme Court which interpret the prohibition against cruel and 

unusual punishment provided in the Eighth Amendment to the 

United States Constitution.” This means that the Supreme Court’s 

interpretation of the Eighth Amendment is both the floor and the 

ceiling for protection from cruel and unusual punishment in 

Florida, and this Court cannot interpret Florida’s prohibition 

against cruel and unusual punishment to provide protection that 

the Supreme Court has decided is not afforded by the Eighth 

Amendment. 

Because the Supreme Court has interpreted the Eighth 

Amendment to limit the exemption from execution to those whose 

chronological age was less than eighteen years at the time of their 

crimes, this Court is bound by that interpretation and is precluded 

from interpreting Florida’s prohibition against cruel and unusual 

punishment to exempt individuals eighteen or more years old from 

execution on the basis of their age at the time of their crimes. This 

Court simply does not have the authority to extend Roper to 

Barwick based on his age of nineteen at the time of the murder. 

Accordingly, Barwick is not entitled to relief.
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C. Extension of Atkins

Barwick’s final claim on appeal is that the circuit court erred 

in denying Claim 3 of his second successive postconviction motion, 

in which he argued that there is no meaningful distinction between 

his reduced moral culpability on account of his “trifecta of 

vulnerabilities”—severe neuropsychological disorder, immutable 

cognitive impairments, and low mental age at the time of the 

murder—and that of individuals with indistinguishable deficits due 

to intellectual disability, and therefore his execution, like that of an 

intellectually disabled person or a juvenile, would violate the Eighth 

and Fourteenth Amendments. In short, Barwick asserts that even 

though he is not intellectually disabled, he is entitled to the same 

protection under Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U.S. 304 (2002), which held 

that the Eighth Amendment prohibits execution of the intellectually 

disabled. The circuit court also framed this as an “extension-ofAtkins” claim and denied it as procedurally barred, untimely, and 

without merit. 

We agree that this claim is procedurally barred because it, or a 

variation of it, has been raised in a prior proceeding. In Claim 5 of 

his initial motion for postconviction relief, Barwick argued that 
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because he is intellectually disabled, his execution would violate the 

Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments under Atkins. See Barwick, 

88 So. 3d at 92 n.6 (identifying as Claim 5 of Barwick’s initial 

postconviction proceedings that “Barwick is ineligible for the death 

penalty pursuant to Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U.S. 304 (2002), and 

section 921.1[3]7, Florida Statutes (2010), because he is 

[intellectually disabled]”).

Similarly, as explained in Issue 2, Claim 22 in Barwick’s initial 

postconviction proceedings was that because he suffers from 

neuropsychological impairments, a mental and emotional age of 

less than eighteen years, and lacks the requisite highly culpable 

mental state his execution would violate the Eighth and Fourteenth 

Amendments. And in Argument 1 of his state habeas petition, 

Barwick also argued that his execution would violate the Eighth 

and Fourteenth Amendments, due to his brain damage, mental 

impairment, mental and emotional age of less than eighteen years, 

and lack of the requisite highly culpable mental state.

At their core, all three of the aforementioned prior claims and 

the instant claim on appeal have posited that Barwick should be 

exempt from execution due to his mental deficiencies. Thus, the 
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instant claim is a variation of claims that were raised in prior 

proceedings, and as such, is procedurally barred.

Even if this claim had not been raised in a prior proceeding, it 

is still procedurally barred because it could have been raised 

previously. See Branch, 236 So. 3d at 986 (holding that an 

extension-of-Roper claim was procedurally barred in an active 

warrant case because it could have been raised previously); 

Simmons v. State, 105 So. 3d 475, 511 (Fla. 2012) (rejecting as 

procedurally barred a claim, based on Roper and Atkins, that the 

defendant was exempt from execution based on mental illness and 

neuropsychological deficits because it could have been raised in 

prior proceedings).

This claim was also properly denied as untimely. Barwick 

asserts that the circuit court erred in denying this claim as 

untimely, because, according to Barwick, procedural bars do not 

apply to claims of categorical exemption from execution. Barwick is 

wrong. Procedural bars do apply to exemption-from-execution 

claims. See Dillbeck, 357 So. 3d at 100 (holding that this Court’s 

precedent “flatly refutes Dillbeck’s contention that no time limits 

apply to categorical exemption claims”). 
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Finally, even if it were not procedurally barred or untimely, 

this claim is without merit. As we have very recently reiterated,

“the categorical bar of Atkins that shields the intellectually disabled 

from execution does not apply to individuals with other forms of 

mental illness or brain damage.” Id.; see also Carroll v. State, 114 

So. 3d 883, 887 (Fla. 2013) (rejecting as untimely, procedurally 

barred, and meritless, claim that the protections of Atkins and 

Roper should be extended to defendant who is less culpable as a 

result of mental illness); Simmons, 105 So. 3d at 511 (holding claim 

that persons with mental illness must be treated similarly to those 

with intellectual disability due to reduced culpability to be without 

merit); Lawrence v. State, 969 So. 2d 294, 300 n.9 (Fla. 2007) 

(rejecting assertion that the Equal Protection Clause requires 

extension of Atkins to the mentally ill due to their reduced 

culpability). 

This claim is also meritless because, like Barwick’s Roperextension claim, under the Eighth Amendment conformity clause in 

article I, section 17 of the Florida Constitution, this Court must 

interpret Florida’s prohibition against cruel and unusual 

punishment in conformity with decisions of the Supreme Court, 
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which has limited the categorical ban announced in Atkins so that

individuals with mental deficiencies other than intellectual 

disability are outside the scope of that ban. Just as this Court 

lacks the authority to extend Roper to individuals over the age of

seventeen, it also lacks the authority to extend Atkins to individuals 

who, like Barwick, are not intellectually disabled as provided in 

Atkins. Thus, Barwick’s “trifecta of vulnerabilities” does not exempt 

him from execution.

III. CONCLUSION

For the reasons stated above, we affirm the circuit court’s 

order summarily denying the second successive postconviction

motion and its orders sustaining the objections to the public 

records requests and denying a stay of execution. 

No motion for rehearing will be entertained by this Court. The 

mandate shall issue immediately.

It is so ordered.

MUÑIZ, C.J., and CANADY, COURIEL, GROSSHANS, and 

FRANCIS, JJ., concur.

LABARGA, J., concurs in result with an opinion.
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LABARGA, J., concurring in result.

As the majority observes, “post-warrant litigation is arduous,” 

see majority op. at 7, and a death warrant by its very nature 

requires expedited proceedings. However, these solemn proceedings 

ultimately involve carrying out a sentence of death for the most 

aggravated and least mitigated of murders and must still ensure 

due process of law. I am extremely concerned by the recent pace of 

death warrants and the speed with which the parties and involved 

entities must carry out their respective duties.

Barwick has raised concerns about the accelerated timetable 

and argues that “[t]he death warrant proceedings in [his] case 

lacked any indicia of meaningfulness.” While I agree that Barwick’s 

claims are not entitled to relief under this Court’s precedent, I 

nonetheless caution that even in this final stage of capital 

proceedings, a meaningful process must be ensured.

An Appeal from the Circuit Court in and for Bay County,

Christopher N. Patterson, Judge

Case No. 031986CF000940XXAXMX

Robert Friedman, Capital Collateral Regional Counsel, Karin L. 

Moore, Assistant Capital Collateral Regional Counsel, and Drew A. 

Sena, Assistant Capital Collateral Regional Counsel, Northern 

Region, Tallahassee, Florida,
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for Appellant

Ashley Moody, Attorney General, Jason W. Rodriguez, Assistant 

Attorney General, and Steven Edward Woods, Assistant Attorney 

General, Tallahassee, Florida,

for Appellee