Attorneys seek stay in Ernest Johnson death row case
The Missouri Attorney General’s Office and lawyers for a man condemned to die for a Columbia triple killing have asked for a stay in his case pending the resolution of another death-row challenge.
Attorneys for Ernest Lee Johnson and Attorney General Josh Hawley’s office filed the joint motion in federal court last week. In the filing the lawyers ask the Western District of Missouri to stay Johnson’s case pending the U.S. Supreme Court’s review of another Missouri death row case involving Russell Bucklew. Bucklew was convicted in Boone County on a change of venue in the kidnapping and rape of his ex-girlfriend and the killing of a man who knew her in 1998.
“The stay should be granted because it is likely to preserve limited judicial resources and because the United States Supreme Court’s ruling in Bucklew and Johnson will provide guidance to this Court and to the litigants on how to proceed in this case,” the attorneys wrote in the motion.
Bucklew and Johnson are each trying to get their death penalty convictions overturned by arguing that Missouir’s lethal injection method of execution will result in excess pain and suffering because of their medical conditions. They argue their executions would violate constitutional protections against cruel and unusual punishment.
Johnson’s attorneys write in the motion for a stay that they plan to ask the U.S. Supreme Court to also take up his case.
The U.S. Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals in August sent Johnson’s case back to the lower Western District court. The appeals court judges ruled the lower court was wrong to dismiss Johnson’s claim.
Johnson was first sentenced to death in 1995 for murdering Mabel Scruggs, Mary Bratcher and Fred Jones at a convenience store on Ballenger Lane the year before. Two juries upheld that decision after higher courts reversed the decisions.
