Missouri Supreme Court and Governor Reject Innocence Claims and Refuse to Pause Execution for Marcellus Williams

On September 23, 2024, the Missouri Supreme Court heard oral argu­ments on the joint motion by Marcellus Williams’ legal team and St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney (PA) Wesley Bell to over­turn a low­er court’s deci­sion reject­ing Mr. Williams’ appeal. Later the same day, the state supreme court unan­i­mous­ly denied the motion, stat­ing that there was ​“no cred­i­ble evi­dence of actu­al inno­cence or any show­ing of a con­sti­tu­tion­al error under­min­ing con­fi­dence in the orig­i­nal judg­ment.” Also the same day, Governor Mike Parson reject­ed Mr. Williams’ clemen­cy peti­tion, which will allow the exe­cu­tion sched­uled for 6pm CT on September 24 to ​“be car­ried out as ordered by the [Missouri] Supreme Court.” Mr. Williams has three peti­tions includ­ing a motion for a stay of exe­cu­tion pend­ing before the U.S. Supreme Court. [Update 6 pm EST: The Supreme Court has denied Mr. Williams’ request for a stay of execution.]

“Missouri is poised to exe­cute an inno­cent man, an out­come that calls into ques­tion the legit­i­ma­cy of the entire crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem,” said Tricia Rojo Bushnell, attor­ney for Mr. Williams. ​“Given every­thing we know about Marcellus Williams’ case — includ­ing the new rev­e­la­tions that the tri­al pros­e­cu­tor removed at least one Black juror because of his race, and oppo­si­tion to this exe­cu­tion from the victim’s fam­i­ly and the sit­ting Prosecuting Attorney, the courts must step in to pre­vent this irreparable injustice.” 

During an August 28, 2024 hear­ing, one of the tri­al pros­e­cu­tors admit­ted to exclud­ing a poten­tial juror dur­ing voir dire ​“in part” because of his race, which is ille­gal under Batson v. Kentucky. The joint motion high­lights this Constitutional error, as well as the pres­ence of state attor­neys’ DNA found in new test results that indi­cate the state’s con­t­a­m­i­na­tion of crime scene evidence. 

“Capital pun­ish­ment cas­es are some of the hard­est issues we have to address in the Governor’s Office, but when it comes down to it, I fol­low the law and trust the integri­ty of our judi­cial sys­tem,” said Gov. Parson. Although his pre­de­ces­sor, Eric Greitens, stayed Mr. Williams’ pre­vi­ous­ly sched­uled exe­cu­tion and estab­lished an inde­pen­dent board to inves­ti­gate his cred­i­ble claims of inno­cence, Gov. Parson dis­solved the board and revoked his stay of exe­cu­tion in 2023. ​“Nothing from the real facts of this case has led me to believe in Mr. Williams’ inno­cence,” said Gov. Parson, who has nev­er grant­ed clemen­cy dur­ing his tenure. 

Despite sup­port from PA Bell, who con­cedes the pri­or admin­is­tra­tion com­mit­ted uncon­sti­tu­tion­al errors con­tribut­ing to Mr. Williams’ unre­li­able con­vic­tion and death sen­tence, courts have con­sis­tent­ly reject­ed his appeals, and the Missouri Supreme Court inter­vened at the request of Missouri Attorney General Bailey to over­turn a plea agree­ment reached by both par­ties to remove Mr. Williams from death row. ​“Even for those who dis­agree on the death penal­ty, when there is a shad­ow of a doubt of any defendant’s guilt, the irre­versible pun­ish­ment of exe­cu­tion should not be an option,” said PA Bell in a statement. 

If Mr. Williams’ exe­cu­tion moves for­ward, it would be Missouri’s 100^th exe­cu­tion since the state resumed exe­cu­tions in 1989 and third exe­cu­tion it has car­ried out this year.