Daniel Owen Conahan Jr., the Florida man convicted in the 1996 killing of Richard Montgomery, is making a final legal effort to delay his scheduled execution. Conahan, who has long denied committing the murder, says DNA testing of evidence collected from the crime scene could potentially support his claim that he was not responsible.
Conahan, 72, was sentenced to death after being convicted in 1999 of first-degree premeditated murder and kidnapping. His execution is scheduled for Sept. 10, 2026, in Florida.
Conahan’s Final Push for DNA Testing
Conahan’s attorneys are asking the courts to halt the execution while the results of state DNA testing are obtained. The defense argues that advances in forensic technology could provide important information about evidence recovered in the investigation.
The request comes after the Florida Supreme Court rejected an earlier appeal on Sept. 3. The court found that Conahan’s motion did not provide enough factual grounds to justify the requested post-conviction relief.
Conahan has maintained that the evidence used to convict him was largely circumstantial. No DNA recovered from the crime scene was found to directly connect him to Montgomery’s killing.
Murder Investigation Focused on a Nude Photo Offer
Montgomery was discovered dead in a wooded area near Punta Gorda in April 1996. Investigators determined that he had been strangled and sexually assaulted, and that his body had been mutilated.
Before his death, Montgomery reportedly told his mother that he had been offered money to pose for nude photographs and had met a man named Daniel Conahan.
Investigators also examined similarities between Montgomery’s death and an earlier incident involving Stanley Burden. Burden told authorities that a man who offered him money for nude photographs had taken him into a wooded area, tied him to a tree and attempted to strangle him. Burden survived the encounter.
Investigators later found additional evidence they believed connected Conahan to Montgomery. On the night Montgomery was killed, Conahan’s credit card was reportedly used to purchase items including clothesline, Polaroid film, pliers and a utility knife. Surveillance footage also showed him withdrawing cash shortly afterward.
An undercover investigation subsequently recorded Conahan offering money to investigators to pose for nude photographs.
‘Hog Trail’ Cases Remain Part of the Mystery
Authorities have long associated Conahan with a broader series of killings in southwest Florida that became known as the “Hog Trail Murders.” Investigators suspected that as many as 15 men may have been killed between 1993 and 1996, although Conahan was formally convicted only in Montgomery’s death.
Several bodies were discovered in wooded areas, and investigators identified similarities among some of the cases. Conahan was considered a person of interest in additional deaths but was never charged in those cases.
In 2007, a mass grave containing multiple bodies was discovered in the Fort Myers area, renewing attention on the unsolved killings and Conahan’s possible connection to them.
For now, Conahan’s fate rests on his final legal efforts. If the execution proceeds as scheduled, he would become Florida’s 15th person executed in 2026.
