Death Row Inmate In Missouri Pleads Case Weeks Before Scheduled Execution

Marcellus Williams is scheduled to be executed on Sept. 24.

Death row inmate Marcellus Williams appeared before St. Louis County Circuit Court Judge Bruce Hilton Wednesday during an evidentiary hearing to prove he did not murder a former St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter in 1998, CNN reports.

Williams, 55, is scheduled to be executed Sept. 24 for the murder of Felicia Gayle, who was found stabbed to death in her home.

Despite always maintaining his innocence, Williams was sentenced to death in 2001 after he was convicted of first-degree murder, burglary, robbery, and other charges. The Missouri Supreme Court has ordered the hearing after blocking an agreement, previously approved by Hilton, between the inmate and the St. Louis Prosecuting Attorney’s Office that would have spared Williams’ life.

The case has set Wesley Bell, a local prosecutor running for Congress as a Democrat, against state Attorney General Andrew Bailey, a Republican seeking reelection. In January, Bell ordered the St. Louis Prosecuting Attorney’s Office to file a motion to vacate Williams’ conviction, arguing that DNA evidence, which could potentially exclude Williams as the killer, had never been reviewed by a court.

Prosecutors were expected to present evidence in court to support the motion last Wednesday. The evidence was based on analysis by three DNA experts who concluded that DNA testing excluded Williams as the person who wielded the knife that killed Gayle.

However, the hearing did not proceed as planned after Bailey’s office opposed the local prosecutor’s motion, arguing that new DNA testing revealed the knife had “been handled by many actors, including law enforcement” and therefore would not exonerate Williams. There were also reports that the new DNA testing revealed the presence of DNA from an investigator who worked for the prosecutor’s office during Williams’ trial, as well as the prosecutor who handled the case.

A prosecutor admitted to touching the knife without gloves. A forensic DNA expert testified that due to the knife’s handling in the past, it is impossible to determine whether Williams’ DNA was ever on it.

Now Williams’ attorney, Jonathan Potts, said the mishandling of that evidence “destroyed” Williams’ “last and best chance” to prove his innocence. After last week’s hearing was postponed, Bell’s office announced that it had reached an agreement with Williams. Under the consent judgment, which was approved by the court and Gayle’s family, the inmate would have entered an Alford plea to first-degree murder and, in exchange, would have been resentenced to life in prison.

However, the attorney general’s office opposed the deal and appealed to the state Supreme Court, which quickly blocked the agreement. Bailey’s office commended the court’s intervention, while the prosecutor’s office expressed continued “concerns about the integrity” of Williams’ conviction.

Williams’ claim of innocence is supported by attorneys from the Innocence Project and the Midwest Innocence Project. Since 1973, at least 200 individuals sentenced to death have been exonerated, including four in Missouri.