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Who is Marcellus Williams: Execution in Missouri despite evidence of innocence

innocenceproject.org

261–270 of 514 posts

Re: Who is Marcellus Williams: Execution in Missouri despite evidence of innocence

#261

Many of the contributors to this thread are under the wrong impression that the police found the victim's laptop and other items in Marcellus Williams' car. This is not true. According to Wikipedia, the murder occurred in August 1998, but it was not until May 1999 that the victim's family "announced a $10,000 reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction in the case. In response, two individuals, Henry C…

"The next day, the police searched the Buick LeSabre and found the Post-Dispatch ruler and calculator belonging to Gayle. The police also recovered the laptop computer from Glenn Roberts. The laptop was identified as the one stolen from Gayle's residence."

https://law.justia.com/cases/missouri/supreme-court/2003/sc-...

Re: Who is Marcellus Williams: Execution in Missouri despite evidence of innocence

#262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Democrats had cumulative decades of opportunity to instate abortion access in national law and declined to ever do so. All of the things you're pointing out are true but downstream of that.

Democrats would need a super majority to pass abortion and the last time that happened was 09.

Yes they should have done it in 09 then or one of the many other times. It's been half a century since roe they've had opportunity if it had been important to them.

Re: Who is Marcellus Williams: Execution in Missouri despite evidence of innocence

#263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As stated in the article written by the legal scholars at the Innocence Project: > "There is no reliable evidence proving that Marcellus Williams committed the crime for which he is scheduled to be executed on Sept. 24. The State destroyed or corrupted the evidence that could conclusively prove his innocence and the available DNA and other forensic crime-scene evidence does not match him." DNA evidence is based on pr…

It's sad to me that the Innocence Project, instead of being a neutral third party investigating and then pushing back against wrongful convictions, have just become an all out 'stop the death penalty' advocacy group. Ultimately I think this undermines their cause and hurts their ability to save truly innocent people.

Do you have reason to also claim that any of the points raised in the article are incorrect? If not, that would seem to contradict your claim that they are just a stop-the-death-penalfy advocacy group.

Re: Who is Marcellus Williams: Execution in Missouri despite evidence of innocence

#264

Many of the contributors to this thread are under the wrong impression that the police found the victim's laptop and other items in Marcellus Williams' car. This is not true. According to Wikipedia, the murder occurred in August 1998, but it was not until May 1999 that the victim's family "announced a $10,000 reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction in the case. In response, two individuals, Henry C…

"The next day, the police searched the Buick LeSabre and found the Post-Dispatch ruler and calculator belonging to Gayle. The police also recovered the laptop computer from Glenn Roberts. The laptop was identified as the one stolen from Gayle's residence." https://law.justia.com/cases/missouri/supreme-court/2003/sc-...

Circumstantial. There are a 1000 different ways he could have obtained those items without committing a murder. Prove that having them is proof positive he killed someone.

Re: Who is Marcellus Williams: Execution in Missouri despite evidence of innocence

#265
post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's plenty of evidence. He confessed to his girlfriend, and a cellmate. He pawned the victim's possessions. He was seen disposing of bloody clothes. He already had 15 felony convictions in addition to offenses related to Ms. Gayle's murder: robbery (2), armed criminal action (2), assault (2), burglary (4), stealing (3), stealing a motor vehicle, and unlawful use of a weapon. Now, as to whether this evidence is so…

[flagged]

Reasonable implication, find someone with many prior convictions, accuse them of any crime, present past convictions, and then they are guilty? This seems to defy the very concept of innocent until proven guilty.

Re: Who is Marcellus Williams: Execution in Missouri despite evidence of innocence

#267

Many of the contributors to this thread are under the wrong impression that the police found the victim's laptop and other items in Marcellus Williams' car. This is not true. According to Wikipedia, the murder occurred in August 1998, but it was not until May 1999 that the victim's family "announced a $10,000 reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction in the case. In response, two individuals, Henry C…

"The next day, the police searched the Buick LeSabre and found the Post-Dispatch ruler and calculator belonging to Gayle. The police also recovered the laptop computer from Glenn Roberts. The laptop was identified as the one stolen from Gayle's residence." https://law.justia.com/cases/missouri/supreme-court/2003/sc-...

The full quote from the article in justia.com states the following: "In November of 1999, University City police approached Asaro to speak with her about the murder. Asaro told the police that Williams admitted to her that he had killed Gayle. The next day, the police searched the Buick LeSabre and found the Post-Dispatch ruler and calculator belonging to Gayle. The police also recovered the laptop computer from Glenn Roberts. The laptop was identified as the one stolen from Gayle's residence."

The only thing linking the laptop to Williams was the testimony of a witness. Even if the witness is telling the truth, he has no way of knowing how Williams obtained the laptop.

By any reasonable standard, all this is extremely flimsy evidence: More than a year after the murder, the police found a "Post-Dispatch ruler and calculator" in the suspect's car that belonged to the victim? And someone testified that Williams had the victim's laptop. And it is on the basis of this pitifully weak evidence that you would justify the execution of Williams, the suspect? Even though, as the Innocence Project correctly observes, there is no direct physical evidence linking Williams to the crime scene, and the DNA recovered from the crime scene does not match Williams?

https://law.justia.com/cases/missouri/supreme-court/2003/sc-...

Re: Who is Marcellus Williams: Execution in Missouri despite evidence of innocence

#268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So conviction is a "trap door" of evidence weight? If someone is convicted based on evidence that is later shown to be totally insufficient to support that conviction, this new information does nothing to overturn the conviction?

Can you elaborate on what you mean by "later shown to be totally insufficient to support that conviction"? The sufficience of evidence doesn't randomly change. If you mean that they were convicted based on evidence that shouldn't have been shown to the jury, you can win an appeal on that. The standard before your convicted is that the jury must find you guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. The standard after you've been…

Interesting points. The full details of the evidence was not presented to the jury. In that way, it did change. It is more, "the jury was not told the full story."

I think this re-raises the "trap door" question.

Re: Who is Marcellus Williams: Execution in Missouri despite evidence of innocence

#269
post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Can you rebut every point in the article for us? Second, can you precisely identify the lies?

What’s the value of me doing that, when the case has been prosecuted and was argued in all instances of appellate court literally to death? You can read court opinions, they are plentiful in information, and do not suffer from elementary logic errors.

Re: Who is Marcellus Williams: Execution in Missouri despite evidence of innocence

#270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are severely misunderstanding the role of DNA evidence here - you suggest that those arguing for Williams' innocence (including The Innocence Project) rely solely on the absence of DNA evidence linking Williams to the crime. However, this misrepresents the argument. The absence of DNA evidence is significant not because DNA is expected to be found in every case, but because other substantial forensic evidence (fi…

There is no objective definition of reasonable doubt. DNA evidence of someone other then the accused but not the accused at the crime scene wouldn't introduce reasonable doubt if there was a video of the accused committing the crime, so it doesn't inherently introduce reasonable doubt, but only if the evidence against the accused isn't strong enough, which is again subjective. Responding to an admission of subjectivi…

>There is no objective definition of reasonable doubt.

And I never claimed that there is, I clearly referred to its creation i.e. the _existence_ of reasonable doubt that can be objectively identified through specific factors such as conflicting evidence, inconsistencies in testimony, lack of evidence, or any other substantial issue that undermines the certainty of a defendant's guilt. The degree of the perceived doubt is what's subjective.

>DNA evidence of someone other then the accused but not the accused at the crime scene wouldn't introduce reasonable doubt if there was a video of the accused committing the crime, so it doesn't inherently introduce reasonable doubt, but only if the evidence against the accused isn't strong enough, which is again subjective.

The presence of forensic evidence[0] such as bloody shoeprints, fingerprints, and hair at the crime scene that does not match Marcellus Williams directly introduces reasonable doubt. This isn't about subjective interpretation but a factual mismatch that challenges the prosecution's assertion of his guilt. When critical evidence linked to the crime does not implicate the accused, it inherently raises questions about their involvement, thus fulfilling the criteria for reasonable doubt under the law. This is a clear and objective basis for questioning the conviction.

>Responding to an admission of subjectivity ("to me") with "your subjective opinion is irrelevant" only discourages humilty.

I don't see how this has anything to do with humility, it was more like "there objectively exists contradictory evidence that can't be simply downplayed by personal opinions"

[0] https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2024/09/23/missou... - "Among the evidence police collected: bloody shoeprints and fingerprints, a knife sheath and the suspect's hair collected from Gayle's shirt, hands and the floor. Missing from the house were Gayle's purse and jacket, and her husband's laptop."

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