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| Marcellus Williams |
A nonprofit that seeks to overturn wrongful convictions has asked Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens to put Tuesday's scheduled execution on hold.
The Midwest Innocence Project says new DNA evidence presented last week shows Marcellus Williams didn't kill former St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter Felicia Gayle in 1998.
Williams' attorney, Kent Gipson, asked the state Supreme Court last week to consider two new tests, which he said show that Williams' DNA was not on the knife used in Gayle's death. The court denied the request for a stay of execution.
Midwest Innocence Project Director Tricia Bushnell told St. Louis Public Radio on Sunday that the organization wants Greitens to appoint a board of inquiry to look into the new evidence.
"This is a case that has so many questions in it, and the reality is, Mr. Williams has DNA evidence that says it is not him on the murder weapon, and no one has even let him have a hearing on those results," she said. "It seems impossible that we would execute someone, put someone to death, when there is a question that large, without even giving them a hearing. ... This question has a number of the hallmarks that we see in wrongful convictions."
Bushnell also was critical of the prosecution in the case, which was done in St. Louis County because Gayle was killed in University City. She said the prosecution relied on "what we would call 'incentivized informants.'"
In 2003, the state Supreme Court upheld Williams' conviction, saying there was sufficient evidence to support the jury's conclusion. Spokesmen for Greitens and St. Louis County Prosecutor Bob McCulloch didn't immediately return requests for comment.
Williams' original execution in 2015 was postponed. He is scheduled to be put to death Tuesday.
Missouri will use 2 of its 34 vials of the sedative pentobarbital on Tuesday when it executes Marcellus Williams, who was convicted in the 1998 killing of Felicia Gayle, a former St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter.
The state has enough pentobarbital for 17 executions, Williams' included, according to a document obtained by St. Louis Public Radio. No one except the state of Missouri knows where the stockpile comes from, despite lawsuits from inmates and media outlets.
Source: stlpublicradio.org, August 21, 2017
Don't dishonor murder victim Lisha Gayle by executing Marcellus Williams
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| Missouri's death chamber |
On Tuesday, Missouri is scheduled to execute a man in exactly the kind of case that makes even some supporters of the death penalty queasy.
Way back in 2001, Marcellus Williams was found guilty in the grisly 1998 stabbing death of 42-year-old Lisha Gayle, a former St. Louis newspaper reporter so altruistic that she left journalism to become a volunteer who worked with the disenfranchised.
Williams, who is also serving multiple life sentences on unrelated burglary and robbery charges, had, according to prosecutors, been burglarizing Gayle's apartment when she stepped out of the shower, surprised him and fought back as he killed her.
Only there was never any physical evidence linking Williams to the crime, according to his attorneys and Amnesty International.
Now his attorneys say that new evidence, based on new testing that the court allowed, shows Williams is not a match for the male DNA found on the knife that was the murder weapon.
Instead, an analysis by Greg Hampikian, a Boise State University biologist, shows that the DNA is that of an unknown male.
Why allow the testing and then disregard what it finds?
Williams, who is 48, has always maintained his innocence and said the case against him is based entirely on the word of a former girlfriend and a former cellmate who he insists were only looking for a piece of the $10,000 reward offered in the case.
What harm would it do to make sure he's guilty?
We can't think of any, especially compared to the wrong of putting a man to death for a crime he didn't commit.
The Missouri Supreme Court has denied a petition to delay Williams' execution, so unless the governor or Supreme Court intervenes, he'll be given a lethal injection at 6 p.m. Tuesday.
A spokesman for Attorney General Josh Hawley said he's still confident that Williams is guilty.
But why not make sure the public can be confident of that, too?
We urge the court to appoint a special master to hear Williams' claim of innocence.
Missourians deserve to know for sure that he really is guilty before putting him to death in our name.
And the memory of Lisha Gayle, who worked with the poor and with children, would only be dishonored by an injustice carried out in retribution for the violence done to her.
Source: Kansas City Star, Editorial Board, August 21, 2017
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