ST. LOUIS COUNTY — Two separate filings this week could postpone the execution of Marcellus “Khaliifah” Williams, whose 2001 murder conviction was upheld last week by a judge.
A notice to appeal the most recent ruling was filed Monday night by attorney Matthew Jacober, special counsel for St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Wesley Bell’s office. It will be up to the Missouri Supreme Court to review St. Louis County Judge Bruce Hilton’s ruling.
Then on Tuesday afternoon, Williams’ team of attorneys announced they filed a motion asking the Missouri Court of Appeals Eastern District to reconsider its 2010 denial of Williams’ claim that a trial prosecutor unconstitutionally removed Black prospective jurors because of their race. The almost 400-page motion laid out new evidence from trial prosecutor Keith Larner’s testimony during a day-long Aug. 28 innocence hearing.
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Either court could issue a stay on Williams’ scheduled Sept. 24 execution to give the judges time to review the filings, said Peter Joy, a Washington University School of Law professor who is unaffiliated with the case.
“These are important issues and no court wants to rush into something,” Joy said. “It’s hard to predict, but it appears to me that it may take the Court Of Appeals in the Eastern District longer to consider the arguments that are being raised given the new evidence.”
Williams was convicted of brutally killing former Post-Dispatch reporter Felicia “Lisha” Gayle Picus in 1998 in a University City home in a gated neighborhood. He was sentenced to death by a jury made up of 11 white people and one Black person.
Williams, who is Black, has unsuccessfully appealed and challenged his first-degree murder conviction for more than two decades, ultimately taking the case to the Missouri Supreme Court.
In January, Bell’s office filed to vacate Williams’ conviction, arguing he was innocent.
Eight months later, in August, Hilton heard hours of testimony rehashing evidence that focused on contamination of DNA on the murder weapon, potential racial bias in the jury selection and, in Williams’ lawyer’s view, the unreliable witnesses on which much of his case hung.
Hilton said that Williams’ claim of innocence “unraveled” when an Aug. 19 DNA report showed the DNA profiles on the murder weapon were consistent with Larner and an investigator on the original case — which contradicted previous claims that the killer’s DNA was on the knife and would prove Williams was innocent.
“(Williams’) remaining evidence amounts to nothing more than re-packaged arguments about evidence that was available at trial and involved in Williams’ unsuccessful direct appeal and post-conviction challenges,” Hilton wrote in his ruling. “(Williams) has failed to demonstrate any basis for this court to find Williams actually innocent of first-degree murder.”
Williams and his defense team have maintained his innocence, and have repeatedly pointed out that no physical evidence connects him to the crime other than a stolen laptop he sold to a neighbor.
The prosecution’s two main trial witnesses — Williams’ former cellmate and an ex-girlfriend — have since died.
Joy, the Washington University professor, said if the Eastern District judges conclude there was racial bias in the jury proceedings and it amounted to a due process violation, Williams’ conviction would be vacated and it would be up to the prosecuting attorney to decide whether to retry the case.
But, he said, Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey’s office would be expected to appeal the Eastern District’s decision to the Missouri Supreme Court. His attorneys have fought Williams’ exoneration effort at every step.
If the vacation sticks, the attorney general may be able to step in and decide whether to hold a new trial. But Joy said, given the how much time has passed since the trial and the lack of physical evidence, it would be unlikely they’d try the case again.