Breaking Attorney Statement: Agreement Reached to Ensure Marcellus Williams is Not Executed

(August 21, 2024) Today, Marcellus Williams, an innocent man scheduled to be executed in Missouri on September 24, agreed to enter an Alford plea in exchange for a sentence of life without parole. This resolution ensures that Mr. Williams will not be executed for a crime he did not commit. Mr. Williams has always maintained his innocence in the 1998 murder of Felicia Gayle. No physical or forensic evidence has ever linked Mr. Williams to the crime, and his conviction was based on the incentivized testimony of two unreliable witnesses. 

Prosecuting Attorney Bell had moved to vacate Mr. Williams’ conviction after new DNA testing excluded him as the source of male DNA on the murder weapon. Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey has vigorously opposed the motion to vacate, just as he has fought efforts to exonerate other wrongfully convicted individuals in Missouri.

Today’s plea agreement was reached as the parties were scheduled to begin a hearing on the motion to vacate Mr. Williams’ conviction. The deal was prompted in part by the discovery that the murder weapon contained the DNA of members of the trial prosecution team, demonstrating the State had tainted the evidence.

An Alford plea such as Mr. Williams agreed today to enter is not an admission of guilt, and Mr. Williams continues to maintain his innocence. The plea simply acknowledges that the prosecution has evidence – in this case, the incentivized witness testimony – that could be used to convict him. There is no new evidence linking Mr. Williams to the crime and all physical evidence collected from the crime scene excludes him.

Below is a statement from Tricia Rojo Bushnell, an attorney for Marcellus Williams and Director of the Midwest Innocence Project:

“Marcellus Williams is an innocent man, and nothing about today’s plea agreement changes that fact. 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. 

“Over the past 26 years, no reliable evidence has ever connected Mr. Williams to the crime, and nothing about today’s agreement changes the fact that Marcellus Williams’ DNA is not on the murder weapon. The fact that there is DNA on the knife matching members of the trial prosecution team proves the State of Missouri disregarded critical protocols in the investigation of this case, including mishandling pivotal evidence. But regardless of who may have touched the weapon between 1998 and today and deposited DNA on it, there is no doubt that Marcellus Williams did not do so.”

Today’s signed order can be accessed here.