After he had been in the prison for several years he obtained a copy of the trial transcript and depositions. He spent weeks picking through it, noting discrepancies in prosecution testimony.

That was when he read Don Frye's grand jury testimony for the first time—before the trial, Hadley and Davids had kept it from him. At the time he read it, he says, he had begun to despair; but the hope of disproving Frye's allegations has been a goad to keep him going.

He is circumspect about his religious beliefs and practices. But two devout Christians (not related to him) who have stayed close to him say that they take for granted the sincerity of his faith.

Florida's Death House is a ground-floor annex of the prison's "Q" wing. The annex consists of four cells, a shower and toilet, and a room which contains the wood-framed electric chair in which more than 200 men have died in the past 80 years. Once a week, usually on Wednesday afternoons, the lights dim in the prison for a few seconds, during the regular test of the apparatus.1

The death warrant is a black-bordered document which the governor signs and then transmits to FSP, where the superintendent or his assistant intones it to the prisoner in the presence of official witnesses. The condemned man—now said to be "under active warrant"—is moved immediately into the Death House. All of his belongings are placed outside the cell. If he wishes to brush his teeth, for example, he must request a toothbrush from one of the guards who keeps him under constant observation. Usually warrants are valid for two to three weeks, and the actual executions are scheduled near the end of that window of time (although not so close to the end that they would expire before they could be rescheduled).

Zeigler has twice been under warrant, and walked out of the Death House both times. Once he came within about half a day of his execution.

But that story played out in the arcane arena of appellate law, far from the gritty reality of FSP.

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1   The chair itself does not conduct electricity. The charge is conducted through the body by a metal skullcap and a metal ring that is placed on an ankle; the victim is strapped into the chair, and usually dies of a broken neck, resulting from the violent spasm of his body in reaction to the current. Outsiders have christened the chair "Old Sparky," but the term is almost never used inside the prison.