The 55-year-old was sentenced to death in 2001 for killing Felicia Gayle, a former newspaper reporter found dead in her gated community home.

Marcellus Williams was backed in his appeals for clemency by St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Wesley Bell.

The State of Missouri executed Marcellus “Khalifah” Williams on Tuesday night despite knowing he was most likely innocent of the crime he was condemned for.

Despite weeks of racially-charged advocacy, convicted killer Marcellus Williams was put to death by the State Of Missouri this week. From our vantage . . .

The execution came despite one of the prosecutors in the case saying that Williams' life should be spared because DNA did not connect him to the case.

M arcellus Williams was executed by the state of Missouri on Tuesday, Sept. 24, despite concerns citing his potential innocence. Williams died by lethal injection shortly after 6 p.m. at a Missouri state prison in Bonne Terre, St. Francois County. He was 55 years old.

Marcellus Williams died by lethal injection on Sept. 24 at 6 p.m. CT. for the 1998 stabbing death of newspaper reporter Felicia Gayle

Marcellus Williams had long proclaimed he was innocent in the 1998 fatal stabbing of Felicia Gayle in a St Louis, Missouri, suburb.

Though Williams was convicted of Gayle's murder in 2001 after testimony from 22 witnesses, many have demanded his death sentence be called off