[note 1] The killings occurred just hours after Kennedy escaped from the Union Correctional Institution, where he was serving a life sentence for murder.

[3][4] On May 19, 1978, Kennedy, along with a man named Oliver Cochran, murdered 33-year-old Robert Brown, a motel clerk, during a robbery in Miami.

[2] In 1984, Kennedy attempted to appeal his sentence, arguing his confession should not have been admissible in court, citing that the state did not prove he had knowingly been informed of his right to remain silent.

[7] Kennedy was scheduled to die on February 11, 1986, at 7 a.m. along with convicted killer Paul B. Johnson, who was condemned for killing a deputy sheriff.

[3][4] Oliver Cochran, the man who assisted Kennedy in the 1978 murder that originally sent him to prison, remained imprisoned until his death on December 19, 2021.