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Missouri demise row inmate Marcellus Williams was executed by deadly injection Tuesday for the 1998 homicide of Lisha Gayle, a former newspaper reporter who was discovered brutally stabbed in her suburban St. Louis house.
Williams, 55, died after 6:00 p.m. CDT at a Missouri state jail in Bonne Terre in Francois County, roughly 60 miles southwest of St. Louis, Williams’ lawyer confirmed to ABC Information.
The capital punishment case noticed nationwide consideration with Williams sustaining his innocence, the sufferer’s household opposing the execution and his prosecution submitting motions for appeals at each degree.
“Marcellus Williams must be alive right now. There have been a number of factors within the timeline when choices might have been made that might have spared him the demise penalty. If there’s even the shadow of a doubt of innocence, the demise penalty ought to by no means be an possibility. This end result didn’t serve the pursuits of justice,” Wesley Bell, chief prosecutor for St. Louis County, mentioned in an announcement after the execution.
America Supreme Courtroom denied two separate appeals to spare Williams’ life on Tuesday an hour forward of his execution, regardless of the objection of Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor.
Williams’ lawyer Tricia Rojo Bushnell launched an announcement after SCOTUS’ resolution, saying, “Tonight, Missouri will execute an harmless man Marcellus “Khaliifah” Williams.”
“As darkish as right now is, we owe it to Khaliifah to construct a brighter future. We’re grateful to the St. Louis Prosecuting Legal professional, for his dedication to fact and justice and all he did to attempt to forestall this unspeakable unsuitable. And for the hundreds of thousands of people that signed petitions, made calls, and shared Khaliifah’s story,” Bushnell mentioned.
On Monday, Missouri Gov. Mike Parson and the state’s Supreme Courtroom rejected a bid to halt the execution.
This photograph offered by the Missouri Division of Corrections reveals Marcellus Williams.
Missouri Division of Corrections through AP
In an announcement to ABC Information, Parson mentioned, “No jury nor courtroom, together with on the trial, appellate, and Supreme Courtroom ranges, have ever discovered advantage in Mr. Williams’ innocence claims.”
“On the finish of the day, his responsible verdict and sentence of capital punishment have been upheld. Nothing from the true information of this case have led me to consider in Mr. Williams’ innocence,” Parson added.
Williams was charged with first-degree homicide in 1999 for the killing of Gayle, a social employee and former reporter for the St. Louis Submit-Dispatch. He was discovered responsible in 2001.
Prosecutors in Williams’ authentic trial alleged he broke into Gayle’s house in August 1998 and stabbed her 43 instances with a big butcher knife, in line with courtroom paperwork. Her purse and her husband’s laptop computer have been stolen after the assault.
The kitchen knife used within the killing was left lodged in Gayle’s physique, in line with courtroom paperwork. Blood, hair, fingerprints and shoe prints believed to belong to the perpetrator have been discovered across the house.
Williams’ protection claimed that his DNA was by no means discovered on the homicide weapon and two unidentified sources of DNA would lead investigators to the precise killer.
In DNA proof found in August, it was discovered that the previous prosecutor and investigator who litigated the unique trial didn’t put on gloves when dealing with the homicide weapon, leaving their DNA on the knife, revealing the sources of the unidentified DNA, which didn’t belong to an unidentified killer.
In his assertion Monday, Parson accused Williams’ attorneys of making an attempt to “muddy the waters about DNA proof” with claims which have beforehand been rejected by the courts.
“Nothing from the true information of this case have led me to consider in Mr. Williams’ innocence,” Parson mentioned.
Williams’ execution marks the third in Missouri this 12 months and the a hundredth because the state reinstated capital punishment in 1989.
ABC Information’ Abigail Cruz and Tesfaye Negussie contributed to this report.
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