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Florida set to execute serial killer who preyed on gay men

Posted at 7:46 AM, Aug 22, 2019
and last updated 2019-08-22 07:46:30-04

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — A serial killer who preyed on older, gay men during a spree that left six dead on or near the U.S. East Coast 25 years ago is set to be executed at a Florida prison.

Fifty-seven-year-old Gary Ray Bowles is set to receive a lethal injection Thursday evening, convicted of the November 1994 murder of Walter Hinton in Jacksonville Beach — one of the killings that terrorized the Interstate 95 corridor in eight-month span.

Hinton was Bowles' sixth and final known victim in a rampage that began in Daytona Beach with the slaying of John Hardy Roberts. In between, there were victims in Rockville, Maryland; Savannah, Georgia; Atlanta and Nassau County, Florida.

In each case, Bowles stuffed the victims' throats with objects such as rags toilet paper, dirt and leaves. Investigators say if he hadn't been caught, Bowles would have kept on killing.