Missouri executes murder convict with ‘intellectual disability’

Lawyers for Johnson, a 61-year-old Black man convicted of a 1994 triple murder case, said overwhelming evidence showed he was intellectually disabled.

The US state of Missouri has executed Ernest Johnson, a 61-year-old Black man convicted of a 1994 triple murder case, despite his lawyers’ arguments that overwhelming evidence showed he was intellectually disabled.

The execution, by lethal injection on Tuesday night, came after Missouri Governor Mike Parsons and the US Supreme Court declined to grant clemency sought by former officials, legislators, and Pope Francis.

The Vatican’s envoy to the United States had sent a letter to Parsons on behalf of the pope last week urging him to halt the “killing”.