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    • Marcellus Williams, who is to be executed, says there was no DNA on the knife used
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    Marcellus Williams, who is to be executed, says there was no DNA on the knife used

    Vaseline Posted on

    Marcellus Williams will die by lethal injection on September 24 after being convicted of killing former newspaper reporter Lisha Gayle in her suburban St. Louis home. He has always denied any involvement

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    A Missouri death row inmate set to be executed Tuesday for the 1998 stabbing death of a former reporter continues to maintain his innocence and that no forensic evidence has ever been found linking him to the killing.

    Marcellus Williams, 55, will become the third inmate executed in Missouri this year and the 15th or 16th in the country, depending on whether he is pronounced dead before or after Travis James Mullis, another inmate executed the same day in Texas. Two more executions are scheduled to take place in Alabama and Oklahoma on Thursday.

    Williams was convicted of murdering Lisha Gayle, a former reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, who was fatally stabbed during a burglary of the home she shared with her husband.

    The St. Louis County District Attorney’s Office supports Williams’ claims of innocence and recently filed a motion to throw out his conviction — a motion that was granted by a county judge but quickly challenged by Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey. The case was remanded to the same judge for a hearing, and on Sept. 12, he reversed his decision.

    Meanwhile, those who believe Williams is innocent continue to fight for a reprieve.

    As Williams’ execution approaches, USA TODAY spoke with his attorneys and looks back at the crime and who the man is.

    More about what Marcellus Williams was convicted of

    On the morning of August 11, 1998, Gayle was in the shower when Williams broke into her home on a closed street, according to police.

    The 42-year-old woman left the second-floor bathroom and was walking downstairs when she encountered Williams on the landing, according to police. At some point, she was stabbed 43 times with a kitchen knife from the home.

    Later that night, Gayle’s husband, Daniel Picus, found his wife’s body and called 911. Among the evidence police collected: bloody shoe prints and fingerprints, a knife sheath, and the suspect’s hair collected from Gayle’s shirt, hands, and the floor. Gayle’s purse and jacket were missing from the home, as was her husband’s laptop.

    No suspect was immediately named, but in May 1999, Gayle’s family offered a $10,000 reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction in the case.

    Not long after an inmate named Henry Cole and Williams’ girlfriend, Lara Asaro, named Williams as the perpetrator. At the time of his sentencing, Williams had just begun serving a 20-year sentence for robbing a doughnut shop in downtown St. Louis.

    There was no forensic evidence that Williams was at the crime scene, but the jury convicted him of murder and burglary.

    Williams’ attorneys have argued that both informants benefited from their cooperation with prosecutors, and that their stories sometimes changed or conflicted with other details about the murder. Both witnesses have since died.

    More about who Williams is

    Williams was born in South Bend, Indiana, on December 30, 1968. When he was about 5 years old, his mother and two brothers moved to St. Louis.

    Williams grew up in an impoverished and dysfunctional family where he was exposed to alcohol, drugs and guns at an early age, court records said. He was subjected to violent sexual and physical abuse by some family members, was abandoned by his parents and his family condoned criminal behavior and substance abuse, the records said.

    The death of Williams’ older brother in 1997 affected him deeply, as his brother had been a father figure to him, court records show. That same year, Williams broke into a home and spent time in prison before being convicted in 1998 of stealing the donut shot.

    Williams’ attorneys presented evidence showing he was “a caring and loving father” during the sentencing phase of his murder trial.

    Several of Williams’ family members and friends, including his son and stepdaughter, testified about Williams’ positive relationship with the children and said his execution “would have a significant effect on his family.”

    According to the Innocence Project, Williams spent much of his time in captivity studying Islam and writing poetry.

    Williams was previously scheduled to be executed twice, but both times the execution was stopped

    Williams was scheduled to be executed in January 2015 and August 2017.

    Both lethal injections were halted to allow for further DNA testing and investigation. The most recent stay of execution was ordered by then-Governor Eric Greiten, who appointed a commission of inquiry to investigate the case.

    But in the summer of 2023, newly sworn-in Governor Mike Parson dissolved the board and lifted the ban. The courts, Parsons said, would decide Williams’ fate, and the Missouri Supreme Court issued a third execution order for Williams.

    What did Williams argue in his appeal?

    In January, Williams’ attorneys filed a motion to overturn his conviction and sentence.

    On August 21, District Attorney Wesley Bell’s office and Williams’ attorneys reached an agreement that allowed Williams to enter a new, no-contest plea to first-degree murder in exchange for a sentence of life in prison without parole. The victim’s husband, Daniel Picus, signed the plea.

    Although Bell filed a motion to overturn Williams’ murder conviction, Attorney General Andrew Bailey argued that it should stand. He ordered St. Louis County District Judge Bruce Hilton to hold a hearing on the case. Hilton accepted the motion and granted the request.

    According to Bailey, the defense “created a false narrative of innocence to get a convicted murderer off death row and advance its political goals.”

    During the Aug. 28 hearing, the retired prosecutor who tried the case admitted that evidence that could have exonerated Williams was mishandled in the 1998 trial.

    But on September 12, Hilton refused to overturn Williams’ conviction and sentence, despite questions about DNA evidence from the knife used in the attack. On appeal, his defense team presented evidence that DNA taken from the knife revealed an unknown male profile and did not match Williams.

    “There is no basis for any court to find Williams innocent, and no court has made such a finding,” wrote St. Louis County Circuit Judge Bruce Hilton. “Williams is guilty of first-degree murder and is sentenced to death.”

    Williams’ attorney Tricia Rojo Bushnell told USA TODAY that her client’s defense team will file more appeals and ask for clemency.

    Unless the courts or the governor intervene, Williams will be executed this week.

    Williams is one of five men to be executed in less than a week

    Williams is one of five men expected to be executed in the U.S. over a six-day period, the first of which was Freddie Owens, who was executed in South Carolina on Friday amid fresh doubts about his guilt.

    On Tuesday, at the same time as Williams’ execution, Travis James Mullis will also be executed in Texas for the murder of his infant son.

    After Tuesday’s double execution, two more are expected to take place on Thursday. Alabama will use nitrogen gas to execute Alan Eugene Miller for the 1999 shooting deaths of three colleagues, despite evidence of his mental illness and a witness to the previous nitrogen gas execution in January who described the method as “horrific.”

    Also Thursday, Emmanuel Littlejohn is set to be executed in Oklahoma for the 1992 shooting death of a store clerk, despite his claims that he was not the shooter.

    If all five executions go ahead, the U.S. will have executed 18 death row inmates this year. Another six are scheduled for late December, and more could be added to the calendar.

    Natalie Neysa Alund is a senior reporter for USA TODAY. Reach her at [email protected] and follow her at X @nataliealund.

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