On Sept. 24, Marcellus Williams was wrongfully executed in the state of Missouri for a crime he did not commit. The execution of Marcellus Williams is not an isolated situation — it is a harrowing reflection of the violent racism ingrained in American history and the moral hypocrisy embedded in Missouri’s state policies. If life is to be valued and protected, then Missouri’s contradictory death penalty cannot be ignored; not only to America’s death penalty debate, but also to understanding the realities Black people face in this country.
Following the overturn of Roe v. Wade in June 2022, only 64 abortions were performed in Missouri under the state’s emergency exemption, as reported by the Missouri health department. Despite these restrictive anti-abortion laws, Missouri has committed 97 executions from 1976 to 2023 per-capita, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. 216 individuals have been sentenced to death from 1977 to 2023. As we can see in the case of Williams, Missouri has no plans of stopping or slowing down its practice of capital punishment.
Born on December 30, 1968, in South Bend, Indiana, Marcellus Williams later moved to St. Louis, Missouri with his mother and two brothers at a young age. The murder victim, Felicia “Lisha” Gayle Picus, was a 42-year-old journalist who was born on February 5, 1956 in Rockford, Illinois. She worked as a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch until she decided to begin mentoring and tutoring children in the St. Louis area.
On August 11, 1998, Gayle was found dead in her home with up to 43 stab wounds and a large knife lodged into her neck. With that, her purse and husband's laptop were also found stolen from the home. With no leads in the case, in 1999, the family of Gayle released a statement claiming they would reward those with information about the culprit with $10,000. Two individuals by the name of Henry Cole and Laura Asaro soon came forward and named Marcellus Williams as the individual who robbed and murdered Gayle.
Laura Asaro, Williams’ girlfriend at the time, was initially approached by the police in 1999 due to a solicitation charge. Initially, the police wanted to charge her as an accomplice to this crime as Williams sold and sent a laptop that was from Gayle’s home, and Williams stated that he received the laptop from Asaro. In the past, she worked with the police, but lied under oath in her recorded deposition regarding her arrest history.
Asaro testified that Williams told her in detail about what occurred, in which he allegedly admitted guilt for the death of Lisha Gayle. She testified that she found a purse with the victim's identification in Williams’ car, along with a laptop. Asaro also claimed that she saw scratches on his neck and blood on his shirt. According to neighbors of Asaro, she admitted to receiving money for her testimony against Williams.
Henry Cole, Williams’ cellmate, claimed that Williams confessed to Gayle’s murder while in jail, providing specific details— details that were similar to what was published in the news about the case. Initially, Cole didn’t want to participate as a witness to the case until some form of payment was promised. He even said in his 2001 deposition that he would not have come forward if the prosecutors never approached him with $5,000 for his testimony. A lot of the case made against Williams was based on the testimony of these two individuals, who clearly both had ulterior motives when placing Williams at the scene of the crime.
To this day, there has been no forensic evidence found that connects William to the crime scene or even the crime itself. Prosecutors found that any physical evidence at the crime scene remained inconclusive, which included a bloody shoe print, fingerprints, and hair; none of which matched Williams. Nonetheless, in 2001 he was convicted of first-degree murder and received the death penalty.
He was initially scheduled to be executed in 2015, but in an attempt to appeal, his defense found evidence in the DNA taken from the knife found at the scene that revealed an unknown male. It was later found that the same DNA belonged to members of the prosecution, who at one point were handling the evidence. His execution was then rescheduled for August of 2017, but then Governor Eric Geritens issued a last-minute stay of execution on that day. He appointed a board of inquiry to review all of the evidence in regard to Williams and his case, but in 2023, that board was disbanded by Governor Mike Parson before it could conclude its work and findings.
With no DNA pointing to alternative suspects, a compromise was reached; Williams would enter a new Alford plea to first-degree murder in exchange for life without parole instead of the death penalty. For context, an Alford plea is treated as an admission of guilt for the purpose of a sentencing but isn’t necessarily admitting to actual guilt. The then-Judge Bruce Hilton approved of this agreement, and so did the family of Gayle, but Republican Attorney General Andrew Bailey ended up appealing this decision, pushing for the state supreme court to order Judge Hilton to conduct an evidentiary hearing. It was ruled that the first-degree murder conviction and death sentence would remain in place, and on Sept. 24, 2024, Marcellus Williams was executed at 6 p.m. CT at the Eastern Reception, Diagnostic and Correctional Center in Bonne Terre, Missouri.
The execution of Marcellus Williams is one instance in a centuries-long history of violent racism against Black men in the United States. There is no question that the demographics of Gayle, a white woman, and Williams, a Black man, greatly influenced public perception of the case, as Black men have been portrayed as violent threats to white women since the beginning of American cinema. The Birth of a Nation, one of the first major-motion pictures and the first movie to be viewed in the White House, was a highly influential film that attempted to legitimize lynchings of Black men because of their alleged sexual violence against white women. The film created the caricature of the “Black Brute,” a stereotype that has been upheld to this day to incriminate Black men in crimes they did not commit.
Emmett Till was a Black 14-year-old who was wrongfully accused of whistling at Carolyn Bryant, a white woman, while visiting a store with his cousin in 1955. Later that night, Till was kidnapped, beaten and lynched by Bryant’s husband and brother-in-law; three days later, his body was found in the Tallahatchie River. This is just one example of how Black men have been vilified by American society, making acts of lynching justifiable in white Americans’ eyes. Though lynching is now deemed as a federal hate crime, it can be said that the death penalty is a modern day form of lynching against Black Americans, more commonly Black men. But, how can the death penalty be seen as justified, yet in some states the idea of an abortion is incomprehensible?
Missouri has a long history of being a pro-life state, being the second state to ban abortion after being admitted to the Union in 1821. Decades later, the law was intensified by declaring that any woman who had an abortion at any time during her pregnancy could be found guilty of manslaughter. Abortion could only be legal to save the life of the mother. This law would remain in place until the Supreme Court Roe v. Wade decision.
After the Supreme Court legalized abortion across the nation, anti-abortion activists in Missouri were outraged. Almost immediately, they began finding ways around this decision. For a time, they wanted to require that women provide reasoning for why they wanted the abortion, as well as permission from the father. Though many desired these rules to be put in place, they never succeeded. Missouri placed many restrictions on abortion, but they were struck down by the Supreme Court in 1976.
Immediately after Roe v Wade was overturned in 2022, Missouri banned all abortions with the exception of medical emergencies. Women who receive abortions in Missouri will not face legal repercussions, but any doctor who performs one will face felony charges. This makes it nearly impossible for women to end a pregnancy if they wish, as all doctors are terrified to perform them, even in emergency cases. So, if a woman is unable to end an unwanted pregnancy in the state of Missouri, why is it possible for the state to take away human life through the death penalty?
Of course, the fact that Missouri is so vehemently pro-life may cause one to wonder, why is the death penalty still legal? Missouri has executed 23 people in the past decade, and does not have plans to stop — there are 10 people on Missouri’s death row right now. Yet, women aren’t even given the option to terminate an unwanted pregnancy, no matter their circumstances. These laws existing in the same state are extremely hypocritical.
The execution of Marcellus Williams highlights the profound moral inconsistencies in Missouri’s state policies. How is it possible for a state that champions the sanctity of life through its anti-abortion stance to justify taking life through capital punishment? Williams’ case, riddled with inconsistencies with a lack of solid forensic evidence, should have prompted a deeper reflection of this contradiction. His death stands as a reminder that Missouri’s pro-life values seem to apply selectively, prioritizing unborn lives and disregarding the humanity of those like Williams. If Missouri truly believes in protecting life, this glaring hypocrisy in its legal framework must be addressed so that more lives are not being unjustly taken in the name of justice.
