The Missouri Supreme Court and the state’s Republican governor, Mike Parson, both denied requests Monday from an inmate trying to avoid his scheduled execution.
Marcellus Williams, 55, is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection at 6 p.m. Tuesday in connection with the killing of Lisha Gayle, a social worker and former journalist who was stabbed more than 40 times during a 1998 burglary at her St. Louis home, according to the Associated Press. Williams has maintained his innocence.
Parson denied Williams’ request for clemency to spare his life and sentence him to life in prison. The state Supreme Court also denied a request to stay the execution to allow a lower court to make a new decision on whether a trial prosecutor wrongly excluded a potential black juror because of racial bias.
His attorney argued before the state Supreme Court about alleged procedural errors in jury selection and the prosecution’s misuse of the murder weapon. The court, in a unanimous decision, upheld a lower court ruling dismissing Williams’ claims.
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Marcellus Williams, 55, is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection at 6 p.m. Tuesday. (Missouri Department of Corrections via AP)
“Despite nearly a quarter-century of litigation in state and federal courts, there is no credible evidence of actual innocence or showing of constitutional error that undermines confidence in the original judgment,” Judge Zel Fischer wrote in the state’s decision.
Williams’ attorneys also filed an appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court, which is still pending.
Parson said Williams’ attorneys have had numerous legal opportunities to try to prove their client’s innocence. The governor also said Williams’ attorneys are trying to “muddy the waters on the DNA evidence” with claims that courts have already rejected.
“Nothing in the actual facts of this case has led me to believe that Mr. Williams is innocent,” Parson said in a statement. “Therefore, the sentence imposed on Mr. Williams will be carried out as ordered by the Supreme Court.”
The governor has never granted clemency in a death penalty case.
St. Louis County District Attorney Wesley Bell has sought to overturn Williams’ sentence, raising questions about his culpability. Bell plans to appeal the Missouri Supreme Court’s decision to the U.S. Supreme Court, his spokesman told The Associated Press.
“Even for those who disagree with the death penalty, when there is even a shadow of doubt about a defendant’s guilt, the irreversible punishment of execution should not be an option,” Bell said in a statement.
Tricia Bushnell, an attorney with the Midwest Innocence Project, said, “Missouri is on the verge of executing an innocent man, an outcome that calls into question the legitimacy of the entire criminal justice system.”
At Williams’ initial trial, prosecutors alleged that he broke into Gayle’s home on August 11, 1998, heard water running in the shower, found a large butcher knife and stabbed her 43 times as she was walking downstairs. Gayle’s purse and her husband’s laptop were stolen from the home.
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Joseph Amrine, who was exonerated twenty years ago after spending years on death row, speaks at a rally in support of Missouri death row inmate Marcellus Williams on August 21, 2024, in Clayton, Missouri. (AP)
Williams was accused of stealing a jacket to hide blood on his shirt. Williams’ girlfriend asked him why he was wearing a jacket on a hot day and she said she later noticed the purse and laptop in his car. Williams sold the computer a day or two later, his girlfriend said.
Prosecutors also cited testimony from Henry Cole, who shared a cell with Williams in 1999 while Williams was behind bars on unrelated charges. Cole said Williams confessed to the killing and provided details about it.
Williams’ execution would be the third Missouri has carried out this year and the 100th since the state resumed executions in 1989.
This will be the third time Williams has come close to execution.
In January 2015, he was less than a week away from execution when the state Supreme Court overturned it to allow his lawyers time to conduct additional DNA testing.
Williams was hours away from execution in August 2017 when then-Republican Gov. Eric Greitens granted a stay and appointed a panel of retired judges to review the case. The panel, however, never reached a conclusion. in the case.
Concerns about the DNA evidence also prompted Bell to request a hearing to challenge Williams’ guilt. But days before the Aug. 21 hearing, new testing revealed that the DNA on the knife belonged to people in the district attorney’s office who had handled it without gloves after initial testing.
Missouri Governor Mike Parson delivers the State of the State address on January 18, 2023, in Jefferson City, Missouri. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)
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Without DNA evidence implicating another suspect, attorneys with the Midwest Innocence Project reached a compromise with the district attorney’s office in which Williams would again plead no contest to first-degree murder in exchange for a reduced sentence to life in prison without parole.
Judge Bruce Hilton and Gayle’s family signed the agreement, but at the request of Missouri Republican Attorney General Andrew Bailey, the state Supreme Court blocked the deal and ordered Hilton to an evidentiary hearing, which took place on August 28.
The prosecutor in the 2001 murder case argued during the hearing that the trial jury was fair, even though it included only one black juror. The prosecutor said he dismissed a potential black juror in part because he looked too much like Williams, which Williams’ lawyers say shows improper racial bias.
Hilton ruled earlier this month that Williams’ first-degree murder conviction and death sentence would stand, noting that Williams’ arguments had all been previously rejected, a decision that was upheld Monday by the state Supreme Court.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
