JEFFERSON CITY, Missouri – Lawyers for a Missouri man scheduled to be executed on Tuesday evening have filed a new appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court, alleging racial bias and constitutional errors in the trial.
Marcellus Williams, 55, long maintained his innocence in the 1998 death of Lisha Gayle, a social worker and former newspaper reporter who was stabbed multiple times during a break-in at her suburban St. Louis home. His hopes of having his sentence commuted to life in prison suffered a double blow Monday when Republican Gov. Mike Parson almost simultaneously denied a clemency request and the Missouri Supreme Court denied a stay of execution.
Attorneys acting on behalf of Williams filed motions late Monday challenging the state Supreme Court’s decision.
“We have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to stay the execution of Marcellus Williams on Tuesday because the prosecutor revealed that he excluded at least one black juror before the trial because of his race,” Tricia Bushnell, a lawyer for Mr. Williams, said in a press release.
The prosecutor in the 2001 murder trial, Keith Larner, testified at a hearing in August that he rejected a potential black juror in part because he looked too much like Williams – a statement that Williams’ lawyers said showed inappropriate racial bias.
Bushnell said Larner excluded six of seven black potential jurors. The jury ultimately consisted of 11 white and one black member. Larner claimed the selection process was fair.
The state Supreme Court, in a unanimous decision Monday afternoon, upheld a lower court’s ruling that had rejected Williams’ arguments.
“Despite nearly a quarter century of litigation in state and federal courts, there is no credible evidence of actual innocence or proof of constitutional error that undermines confidence in the original verdict,” wrote Missouri Supreme Court Justice Zel Fischer.
Parson accused Williams’ lawyers of attempting to “obscure the situation surrounding DNA evidence” with claims that the courts have repeatedly rejected.
“None of the actual facts of this case led me to believe in Mr. Williams’ innocence,” Parson said in a statement.
Parson, a former sheriff, has never granted clemency in death penalty cases. Williams’ execution would be the third in Missouri this year and the 100th since the state resumed executions in 1989.
St. Louis County District Attorney Wesley Bell has sought to overturn Williams’ conviction because of doubts about his guilt. His office has joined attorneys with the Midwest Innocence Project in asking the U.S. Supreme Court for a stay of proceedings.
“Even for those who oppose the death penalty, irreversible execution should not be an option when there is even the slightest doubt about a defendant’s guilt,” Bell said in a statement.
This is the third time Williams has faced execution. In January 2015, he was less than a week away from being executed when the state Supreme Court canceled it, giving his lawyers time to conduct additional DNA testing.
In August 2017, his execution was imminent when then-Republican Governor Eric Greitens granted a stay and appointed a panel of retired judges to investigate the case, but that panel never reached a conclusion.
Questions about DNA evidence also prompted Bell to request a hearing challenging Williams’ guilt. But days before the Aug. 21 hearing, new tests showed that the DNA on the knife came from prosecutors’ employees who handled it without gloves after the original crime lab tests.
Because there was no DNA evidence pointing to another suspect, attorneys with the Midwest Innocence Project reached a compromise with prosecutors: In exchange for a new life sentence without parole, Williams would enter a new plea to premeditated murder.
Judge Bruce Hilton and Gayle’s family signed the agreement, but at the urging of Missouri’s Republican Attorney General Andrew Bailey, the Missouri Supreme Court blocked the agreement and ordered Hilton to face an evidentiary hearing, which took place on August 28.
Hilton ruled on Sept. 12 that the first-degree murder conviction and death sentence would stand, noting that Williams’ arguments had all previously been rejected. That decision was affirmed by the state Supreme Court on Monday.
Prosecutors in the original case against Williams said he broke into Gayle’s home on Aug. 11, 1998, heard water running in the shower and found a large butcher knife. Gayle, a former reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, was stabbed 43 times as she came down the stairs. Her purse and her husband’s laptop were stolen.
Authorities said Williams stole a jacket to hide blood on his shirt. Williams’ girlfriend asked him why he would wear a jacket on a hot day. The girlfriend said she later saw the purse and laptop in his car and that Williams sold the computer a day or two later.
Prosecutors also relied on testimony from Henry Cole, who was in a cell with Williams in 1999 when Williams was incarcerated on other charges. Cole told prosecutors that Williams confessed to the murder and provided details about it.
Williams’ lawyers said fingerprints, a bloody shoe print, hair and other evidence at the crime scene did not match Williams.
___
Salter reported from O’Fallon, Missouri.
