A Florida inmate convicted of murdering a 14-year-old boy at a New Year’s Eve party in 1982 has been executed, becoming the oldest person ever put to death in the state. The case matters because it closes one of Florida’s longest-running death penalty cases and draws attention to the continued use of capital punishment decades after the original crime.

The man was 79 when he was executed and had spent more than 40 years on death row after being convicted of killing the teenager during a party shooting. Reports said his final words were disclosed shortly before the execution, adding a final public detail to a case that had remained in the courts for decades through appeals and legal challenges. The execution set a state record for age, underlining both the length of the legal process and the rarity of executions involving prisoners of such advanced age.