A Missouri man was executed for a 1998 murder. Was he guilty or innocent?

JEFFERSON CITY, Missouri (AP) — Shortly before his death, Missouri death row inmate Marcellus Williams was given the opportunity to make one final statement to the world.

He spoke few words – neither claiming his innocence nor admitting guilt in the 1998 murder of Lisha Gayle, a social worker and former reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch who was stabbed 43 times during a break-in at her suburban St. Louis home. Williams instead seemed at peace with his fate, writing simply: “All praise be to Allah in every situation!!!”

Williams’ execution on Tuesday has sparked debate about whether it should have happened.

The governor, attorney general and Missouri Supreme Court remain convinced of his guilt. His defense attorneys continue to insist on his innocence. The St. Louis County prosecutor believes Williams’ sentence should have been commuted to life imprisonment, citing outstanding issues. Gayle’s family, which has not spoken publicly, has also joined in calling for Williams to live.

The Missouri execution, carried out at a prison in Bonne Terre, was one of five scheduled to take place in the United States within a week, reigniting a long debate over the use of the death penalty in the states.

What evidence points to Williams’ guilt?

When Gayle was killed, Williams later sold items stolen from her home or found them in his possession. A former girlfriend and an inmate who shared a cell with Williams also testified at his trial that he confessed to murdering Gayle.

The ex-girlfriend told police that when Gayle picked her up the day of Gayle’s death, she noticed that he was wearing a jacket despite the heat outside, and that there was blood on his shirt, scratches on his neck, and a laptop in his car. She told police that when she looked in the trunk of the car the next day, she found a purse that contained Gayle’s identification.

When police searched Williams’ car more than a year after Gayle’s death, they found a ruler and calculator from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that had belonged to Gayle. Police also recovered a laptop that had been stolen from Gayle’s home by a man who had purchased it from Williams.

Williams’ attorneys argued that the ex-girlfriend and cellmate were convicted felons who wanted a share of a $10,000 reward. Williams’ former cellmate received a $5,000 reward. The ex-girlfriend never requested the reward, the governor’s office said.

What evidence is presented for Williams’ innocence?

Authorities found no physical evidence at the scene linking Williams to Gayle’s death.

Williams’ lawyers pointed out that a bloody shoe print, fingerprints and hair found at the crime scene did not match Williams, but a prosecutor said such tests were inconclusive.

The knife used in the murder was also left at the crime scene. A crime scene investigator testified at Williams’ trial in 2001 that the killer was wearing gloves. But questions circulated for years about the knife’s DNA analysis.

The state Supreme Court canceled Williams’ scheduled execution in 2015 to buy time for more DNA testing. Just hours before Williams’ execution was rescheduled in 2017, then-Governor Eric Greitens also canceled the lethal injection due to DNA questions. Greitens appointed a panel of retired judges to investigate the case, but the panel never reached a conclusion before Governor Mike Parson disbanded it in 2023.

In August, new tests found that DNA on the knife matched that of members of the prosecution who had handled it without gloves. With no evidence pointing to anyone else, Williams’s lawyers abandoned their efforts to claim innocence in court and focused their arguments on alleged procedural errors, including that the prosecution mishandled evidence and wrongly excluded a black man from the jury in part because of his race.

Were innocent people executed?

Not a single innocent person has been executed in the United States since the death penalty was reinstated in 1972. However, according to the Death Penalty Information Center, at least 21 people have been executed despite “strong and credible” claims of innocence. The group said Williams, who was added to the list on Wednesday, is among that number.

Two other Missouri men are also on the center’s list. They are Walter Barton, who was executed in May 2020 for the fatal stabbing of an 81-year-old woman, and Larry Griffith, who was executed in June 1995 for the fatal drive-by shooting of a 19-year-old man.

In addition, the center lists three current death row inmates who face execution despite strong protestations of innocence: Richard Glossip, convicted in Oklahoma of the contract killing of a motel owner; Toforest Johnson, who is scheduled to be executed in Alabama for the murder of an off-duty deputy sheriff; and Robert Robertson, convicted in Texas of the murder of his two-year-old daughter.

Why not let Williams spend life in prison?

At the time of Williams’ murder trial, he had already been convicted of burglary, robbery, theft and assault in other cases. A jury found him guilty of first-degree murder in Gayle’s death, which in Missouri is punishable by either death or life in prison without parole. It took the jury just 90 minutes to decide he deserved the death penalty.

St. Louis County District Attorney Wesley Bell, a Democrat who took office in 2019 and is running for Congress, invoked a relatively new Missouri law to reopen the question of Williams’ guilt or innocence. Bell struck a deal in August with the Midwest Innocence Project, which represented Williams, under which Williams could have entered a new, unconditional plea to premeditated murder in exchange for a new life sentence without parole. But Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey, a Republican, objected, and the courts upheld the death penalty.

Ultimately, the decision to execute rested with Parson, who could have used his powers as governor to commute Williams’ sentence to life imprisonment.

A clemency petition filed on Williams’ behalf asked for clemency, noting that Gayle’s family also favored a life sentence rather than the death penalty. But Parson disagreed, stating in his own closing argument in the case, “No juror or judge has ever found Williams’ claim of innocence credible.”

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Hanna reported from Topeka, Kansas.

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