A Day Before Scheduled Execution, U.S. Supreme Court Asked to Consider Marcellus Williams' Death Row Case

09/23/2024 03:54 PM

County prosecutors and defense lawyers both claim that mishandled evidence and racial bias tainted the murder case. Marcellus Williams is slated for execution Sept. 24

Since January, county prosecutors have tried to get Marcellus Williams — a man they believe is likely innocent of a crime they convicted him of decades ago — off Missouri's death row.

In a 73-page joint brief filed this weekend — the latest effort to half his execution by lethal injection slated tomorrow, Sept. 24 at 6 p.m. CT — the county prosecutors and defense lawyers agree there is no forensic evidence tying Williams to the 1998 stabbing death of Felicia Gayle.

The bloody footprints tracked inside Gayle's home do not match his.

The hairs found near her body do not belong to him.

And the kitchen knife does not bear his fingerprints.

Related: Despite Prosecutors' 'Concerns' About Conviction, Marcellus Williams Still on Death Row After Judge's Ruling

Earlier this month, Circuit Judge Bruce F. Hilton denied Williams's motion to vacate his murder conviction, saying there was "no basis for a court to find that Williams is innocent."

In the joint brief, county prosecutors and defense lawyers say the judge's decision was "erred."

Oral arguments were slated in Missouri Supreme Court Monday, Sept. 23, the same day the Innocence Project, which represents Williams, appealed the case to the United States Supreme Court, citing racial bias in jury selection and asking for a stay to his execution. (In the joint brief, county prosecutors admitted the office applied such racial bias in the case of at least one potential juror.)

The last-ditch effort to halt Williams's execution is the latest in a years-long effort that has been opposed on multiple occasions by state officials.

Potentially exonerating evidence first came to light seven years ago, but in 2023 Governor Mike Parson dissolved the Board of Inquiry created to review that evidence before they released any report or recommendation.

After additional DNA evidence came back this August, revealing that the fingerprints on the murder weapon matched that of the assistant prosecuting attorney and one of the investigators – both of whom ultimately admitted in affidavits that they had handled the knife without gloves ahead of William's 2001 trial, per the joint filing – county prosecutors and defense counsel entered an agreement Aug. 21 designed to take Williams off death row. 

But later that day, Attorney General Andrew Bailey blocked the agreement.

"It is in the interest of every Missourian that the rule of law is fought for and upheld – every time, without fail," Bailey said in a statement following his filing, adding: "All the evidence the jury relied on to convict the defendant remains intact. The victim's personal items were found in Williams's car after the murder. A witness testified that Williams had sold the victim's laptop to him. Williams confessed to his girlfriend and an inmate in the St. Louis City Jail, and William's girlfriend saw him dispose of the bloody clothes worn during the murder. All of the evidence in question was available at trial."

County prosecutors said in a motion to vacate in January that that witness testimony was "undermined" and that the duo were "known unreliable witnesses who would lie to help themselves." County prosecutors further allege that "the only physical evidence corroborating" the girlfriend's testimony was the laptop, which at the time of pawning Williams said his girlfriend had given him to sell.

Related: Evidence of Marcellus Williams's Potential Innocence Came to Light in 2017. He is Slated for Execution in 26 Days

Neither the offices for the governor nor the attorney general responded to PEOPLE for comment in time for publication.

Johnathan Shiflett of the governor's office said in a Sept. 13 email to PEOPLE that the governor was following "standard practice" in the death row case, adding: "Mr. Williams has a right to due process and Governor Parson respects that. Governor Parson has not said Mr. Williams should or should not be executed – the Courts, in following state law, decide that."

In the new filing, both parties call for a comprehensive hearing to prove that Williams's constitutional rights were allegedly violated in past proceedings despite evidence of "the destruction of potentially favorable evidence in bad faith" and "despite clear and convincing new evidence" that allegedly showed the prosecution struck "at least one potential juror" for "racially discriminatory reasons."

At trial, a jury of 11 White people and 1 Black person convicted Williams of first-degree murder, first-degree burglary, armed criminal action and robbery.

The prosecution used six of their nine peremptory strikes to keep Black jurors off the case, per the joint filing. 

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Explaining those decisions in court last month, the prosecutor at the time, Keith Larner testified, per the filing, that he struck one such juror because he thought the man resembled Williams, who is also Black, saying they looked like brothers – in part because they were both young Black men with glasses – and that the potential juror had the same "piercing eyes" as Williams.

In his Sept. 12 judgment, Hilton found that Larner "had a good faith basis and reasons for handling the knife without gloves" and cited the prosecutor's own testimony excusing his decision to strike Black jurors.

Williams is one of eight executions scheduled across the country in the next month, according to calculations by Amnesty International USA.

Williams, who writes poetry and serves as the imam for Muslim prisoners at Potosi Correctional Center in Washington County, Mo., has not spoken publicly about his time on death row but released a set of poems to PEOPLE through his attorneys.

In a poem entitled "Exoneration Over Mitigation," the 55-year-old writes: "add my case to the shameless growing rate, / how can those be stopped who use and abuse criminal justice as a tool to oppress a race- /and a multitude of undesirables like a system of caste? / yes, yes the subject is touchy and delicate, / sensitive but necessary for the awake, / is it possible for the lost to be found before it's too late?"

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