Murder of Felicia Gayle


Felicia Gayle Picus was a former St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter who was found stabbed to death in her St. Louis, Missouri home.

Murder

Gayle, 42 years old at the time, was murdered during a burglary in her gated community home located in the University City suburb of St Louis, Missouri on August 11, 1998. She was stabbed between 10 times and 43 times with a butcher's knife.

Investigation and trial

Police arrested Marcellus Williams for the crime based on a jailhouse confession to fellow inmate Henry Cole, and testimony of his former girlfriend Lara Asaro for which $10000 was paid. No physical evidence connects Williams to the murder, although the police found some of Gayle's possessions, including her husband's laptop, in the car Williams drove that day. In December, DNA testing results cast fresh doubt on the conviction. On August 15, 2017 the Supreme Court of Missouri summarily denied him a new execution stay, despite recently obtained results of that testing that support his innocence claim.
Williams was sentenced to death in 2001 by St. Louis County Circuit Judge Emmett M. O’Brien. He is held at Potosi Correctional Center and was scheduled to be executed by lethal injection on 22 August 2017. A last minute stay of execution was issued by Governor Eric Greitens and a Board of Inquiry was initiated. The Board is headed by Carol E. Jackson and consists of 5 retired judges. It has subpoenaed both prosecution and defense. The Board had hearings in August 2018, and Governor Mike Parson will receive the Board's conclusion, and make his decision.
The Governor stayed the execution, and as of January 2019, they are still looking into new findings.