Inmate Marcellus Williams from Missouri escapes execution through deal

A death row inmate in Missouri has reached an agreement with prosecutors that will see him sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

However, the state's attorney general opposes the deal that puts 55-year-old Marcellus Williams on trial and wants the execution to take place on September 24.

Williams was found guilty of killing social worker Felicia Gayle during a burglary of her home in a gated community in suburban St. Louis in 1998.

But the knife with which the former St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter was stabbed 43 times was found to have another person's DNA on it.

“Marcellus Williams is an innocent man, and nothing in today's agreement changes that fact,” his lawyer Tricia Bushnell said in a statement to the AP news agency.

On Wednesday, Williams entered an Alford plea. The defendant did not admit to the crime, but acknowledged that the prosecution had enough evidence to convict him. He will be officially sentenced on Thursday.

In August 2017, his execution was scheduled to take just hours until then-Republican Governor of Missouri Eric Greitens granted a stay based on new DNA tests that were not available at the time of the murder.

The results showed that the genetic material on the blade did not match that of Williams.

New DNA test results released Monday showed that the weapon had been contaminated by investigators' handling.

Earlier this year, District Attorney Wesley Bell filed a motion with the court to overturn Williams' conviction.

The “lack” of evidence “raises inevitable doubts” about the conviction, wrote Democrat Bell.

He also said that there was racial discrimination in the selection of the jury of 11 whites and one black that sentenced Williams, who was black, to death.

However, Missouri's Republican Attorney General Andrew Bailey is appealing to the Missouri Supreme Court to allow the execution to proceed.

In a June court document, he said the evidence against Williams was “overwhelming.”