Man has schizophrenia, intellectual disability, lawyers say. Missouri will execute him

Katie Moore
·3 min read
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A fourth person is scheduled to die by lethal injection this year in Missouri, which is one of just a handful of states that has recently carried out executions.

Johnny A. Johnson, 45, was sentenced to death for the attempted rape and murder of 6-year-old Casey Williamson, who was killed July 26, 2002, in St. Louis County.

The Missouri Supreme Court handed down a warrant of execution scheduled for Tuesday, Aug. 1.

Attorneys for Johnson have argued that he suffers from mental illness including schizophrenia and has diminished intellectual functioning, an appeal filed with the Missouri Supreme Court said.

Prosecutors said he was “smart enough” and “had succeeded in manipulating the mental health system his whole life,” according to the court document.

After several years of carrying out no more than one execution per year — there were none in 2018 — Missouri has recently increased its pace. Kevin Johnson was executed Nov. 29, Amber McLaughlin was executed Jan. 3 and Leonard Taylor was executed Feb. 7.

Michael Tisius is scheduled to die June 6. The 42-year-old was convicted in the deaths of two Randolph County jail workers in June 2000. Last month, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights called for his execution to be halted, saying the state violated his rights by not protecting him from abuse as a child and using exaggerated evidence about his behavior in prison during resentencing.

Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey has also requested an execution date be set for Brian Dorsey, a 51-year-old man convicted of murdering his cousin and her husband.

Gov. Mike Parson, who took office in 2018, has not granted clemency to anyone scheduled to die, despite claims of intellectual disability, sentencing loopholes and innocence.

According to the Death Penalty Information Center, Missouri has carried out 95 executions since capital punishment was reinstated in 1976 in the U.S., the fifth most in the country.

Four states, including Missouri, Texas, Oklahoma and Florida have used the death penalty this year. Thirty-six states do not have the death penalty or have not used it in at least 10 years, DPIC data shows.

Michelle Smith, co-director of Missourians to Abolish the Death Penalty, said the state ranks high on “a horrible list.”

“We should be a more civilized society,” Smith said. “There is a better way to deal with people who have committed the most heinous crimes.”

Three bills to abolish the death penalty and commute the sentences to life in prison have been filed in the Missouri House. Two were sponsored by Democrats and the third by a Republican, but none have hearings scheduled.

Prisoners sentenced to death in Missouri are held at Potosi Correctional Center and transferred to Eastern Reception, Diagnostic and Correctional Center in Bonne Terre. The death penalty is carried out by lethal injection.

Seventeen men remain on death row in Missouri, according to the Department of Corrections.