8^th Circuit Lift Stay of Execution for Death-Sentenced Missouri Prisoner with Schizophrenia

On July 29, 2023, the 8^th Circuit Court of Appeals lift­ed a tem­po­rary stay of exe­cu­tion that had been issued for Johnny Johnson, a death-sen­tenced pris­on­er in Missouri. Mr. Johnson’s attor­neys allege that he is insane and there­fore inel­i­gi­ble for exe­cu­tion. Barring a last-minute stay from the U.S. Supreme Court, Mr. Johnson will be exe­cut­ed by lethal injec­tion on August 1, 2023, for the 2002 killing of 6‑year-old Casey Williamson.

Attorneys for Mr. Johnson assert that his long­stand­ing, severe men­tal ill­ness and diag­nosed schiz­o­phre­nia pre­vent him from under­stand­ing the con­nec­tion between his immi­nent exe­cu­tion and the crime he com­mit­ted. In their briefs, his attor­neys note that “[Mr.] Johnson has delu­sions about the dev­il using his death to bring about the end of the world.” They also argue that the state process under which he was eval­u­at­ed for com­pe­ten­cy was deeply flawed. A neu­ropsy­chi­a­trist, board-cer­ti­fied in foren­sic psy­chi­a­try, found that Mr. Johnson does not ratio­nal­ly under­stand the rea­sons for his exe­cu­tion. The state coun­tered with a 1.5‑page affi­davit from a non-foren­si­cal­ly trained prison coun­selor who had only 70 min­utes of total con­tact with Mr. Johnson over three years. In June of 2023, the Missouri Supreme Court declined to inter­vene in Mr. Johnson’s sched­uled exe­cu­tion, rul­ing that he had ​“failed to make a ​‘sub­stan­tial thresh­old of insanity.’”

The United States Supreme Court held in Ford v. Wainwright (1986) that exe­cut­ing the insane is ​“sav­age and in humane” and vio­lates the Eighth Amendment’s pro­hi­bi­tion against cru­el and unusu­al pun­ish­ment. The Court lat­er clar­i­fied in Panetti v. Quarterman (2007) that pris­on­ers must have a ratio­nal under­stand­ing of the rea­sons for their exe­cu­tion to be con­sid­ered sane enough for execution.

Prior to Casey’s mur­der, Mr. Johnson had been diag­nosed with schiz­o­phre­nia and stopped tak­ing his med­ica­tion upon release from a men­tal health facil­i­ty in January 2002. According to his lawyers, those close to Mr. Johnson dur­ing this time said he stopped tak­ing his med­ica­tion because it made him ​‘feel like a zom­bie.’ At this point, he was no longer help­ing care for his 2‑year-old child and did not com­ply with the con­di­tions of his pro­ba­tion for pre­vi­ous felony theft and bur­glary charges. In 2005, Mr. Johnson was for­mal­ly con­vict­ed after three hours of jury delib­er­a­tion, and was found guilty of first-degree mur­der, as well as armed crim­i­nal action, kid­nap­ping and attempt­ed rape. The judge pre­sid­ing over Mr. Johnson’s case lat­er sen­tenced him to death by lethal injec­tion, adding that this case was ​“per­haps the most heinous crime” he had overseen.

Casey Williamson’s moth­er, Angie Wideman, told FOX 2 news in St. Louis, Missouri that ​“it’s her place to rep­re­sent Casey.” Ms. Wideman believes that God and those who fought for Casey at tri­al will still con­tin­ue to do so. She has ​“been look­ing for­ward to putting this part of it to rest,” even though she will ​“nev­er put Casey to rest, but just put this part to rest.”

Missouri has exe­cut­ed three oth­er indi­vid­u­als this year: Amber McLaughlin, Leonard Taylor, and Michael Tisius.