Updated at 5:45 p.m. Aug. 21
A St. Louis County circuit judge accepted an agreement Wednesday that will spare Marcellus Williams from the death penalty but keep him in prison for life.
“Marcellus Williams is an innocent man, and nothing about today’s plea agreement changes that fact,” said Tricia Rojo Bushnell, executive director of the Midwest Innocence Project and an attorney for Williams. “By agreeing to an Alford plea, the parties will bring a measure of finality to Felicia Gayle’s family, while ensuring that Mr. Williams will remain alive as we continue to pursue new evidence to prove, once and for all, that he is innocent.”
Under an Alford plea, a defendant does not admit guilt but accepts that there is evidence that could persuade a jury to convict.
Williams was sentenced to death for the 1998 murder of Gayle, a former St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter, and was to be executed on Sept. 24. He’s scheduled to be officially resentenced on Thursday. The delay was needed to accommodate the schedule of Gayle’s then-husband, who was traveling internationally and has a right under state law to testify.
The hearing on Wednesday was originally scheduled so St. Louis County prosecutors could argue that Williams’ conviction should be thrown out. But their motion to vacate hinged on DNA testing done on the handle of the murder weapon that experts said excluded Williams as the killer. In court on Wednesday afternoon, prosecutors revealed that additional testing conducted earlier this week had found the DNA was consistent with Ed Magee, an investigator in the office at the time. That meant the evidence had been mishandled at some point but also undermined Williams’ claim of innocence. The findings prompted prosecutors and attorneys for Williams to begin negotiations to settle the case.
In court on Wednesday, special prosecutor Matthew Jacober said the prosecutor’s office regrets the improper handling of the knife back then, acknowledging that it undermined confidence in Williams’ conviction.
Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey’s office filed an appeal Wednesday fighting the agreement and said it would continue to seek the death penalty, questioning the court’s authority to reach such a deal.
“I am proud of how hard we have fought for the rule of law in this case,” Bailey said in a statement. “Throughout all the legal games, the defense created a false narrative of innocence in order to get a convicted murderer off of death row and fulfill their political ends.”
Under Missouri’s constitution, the state Supreme Court has the final say in all cases in which the death penalty has been imposed. That means the judges will likely have to act at some point for the deal to be finalized.
Advocates react
As St. Louis County Circuit Judge Bruce Hilton considered the deal presented to him, advocates for Williams and opponents for the death penalty rallied at a park down the street.
“The people have spoken,” said Obie Anthony, who was exonerated from death row in California in 2011. “Many of us are advocating, not only that you exonerate and free this innocent man, but you do it today.”
Outside the courthouse after the deal was struck, Williams’ son, Marcellus Williams II, said he still believed his father is innocent.
“He feels like if he has to be the vessel of sacrifice to promote change, then so be it,” the younger Williams said.
Michelle Smith, co-director of Missourians to Abolish the Death Penalty, said the day had generated a lot of “conflicting and confused emotions.”
“I am happy that my friend will not be killed on September 24, but I am conflicted, because this system does not work for people that look like Khaliifah [Williams],” she said. “A life sentence without the possibility of parole in Missouri is still a death sentence, and if you are innocent, you shouldn't be incarcerated at all.”
No hair or DNA evidence ever linked Williams to the scene; he was convicted largely on the testimony of a former girlfriend, Laura Asaro, and a jailhouse informant named Henry Cole. Police also found Gayle’s purse and some of her possessions in Williams’ car, and he pawned her husband’s laptop to an acquaintance.
Williams had always sought to cast doubt on Cole and Asaro, both of whom had lengthy criminal histories and a history of lying. Cole also had a record of hallucinations due to his drug use, according to affidavits filed by Cole’s family members.
This is the third time Williams has neared execution. The state Supreme Court first set the date for Jan. 28, 2015. But on Jan. 22, 2015, the court granted a motion for a stay and later appointed a special master to look into the DNA evidence on the murder weapon.
After rejecting Williams’ efforts to review that DNA evidence in 2017, the judges again set an execution date, this time for Aug. 22 of that year. Hours before Williams was set to die, then-Gov. Eric Greitens issued a stay and appointed a Board of Inquiry to look into whether Williams deserved clemency.
The board held a closed hearing in 2018. One member told St. Louis Public Radio in 2022 that its members met for the last time on July 21, 2021, and made oral recommendations to Gov. Mike Parson.
Parson dissolved the board on June 29, 2023, seemingly without taking action on those recommendations. Williams’ attorneys sued, arguing that Parson did not have the authority to take that step. The Supreme Court disagreed in a unanimous ruling issued June 4 and promptly set a third execution date — Sept. 24.
On June 6, the motion to vacate, which had been dormant since February, began moving forward, bringing the parties to Wednesday’s hearing.
Reporter Lauren Brennecke contributed to this report
