In February 1976, at age 21, Daugherty left Michigan with his girlfriend and a favorite uncle, bound for Florida. The trip consumed three weeks, and Daugherty slew four women on the way, for pocket money and the thrill of killing. His final victim was hitchhiker Lavonne Sailer, shot five times in Florida after Daugherty stole her wristwatch, clothing, and twelve dollars she had hidden in her shoe. Arrested in that case, he confessed all four murders, drawing life sentences for three committed outside the Sunshine State. Sentenced to die in Sailer's case, Daugherty exhausted his appeals on November 7, 1988, when the United States Supreme Court rejected his case by a vote of five to four. Moments later, he was strapped into the chair at Raiford prison, loudly proclaiming himself a "sacrificial lamb of a system that is not just."