I was exonerated for murder in Missouri. I wrestle with Ernest Johnson’s execution

I once faced the death penalty in Missouri. Convicted of murder, I was sentenced to 60 years in prison. But 14 1/2 years later, 16 years after my arrest, I was exonerated. Had I been sentenced to death, I might have been executed before my exoneration.

On Aug. 11, a representative with Missourians Against the Death Penalty messaged me about a press conference and rally at the Boone County Courthouse regarding the then-pending execution of Ernest Johnson.

I’d read about Johnson’s case. What he did to his three victims was deliberate and monstrous. If it’s possible to have just murdered three human beings, he didn’t do that. He blitzed and slaughtered them. He brought a gun. He beat them with a hammer and stabbed them with a screwdriver.

From what I understood at the time, he was mentally disabled. He wasn’t innocent.

The Missouri innocence community and the state attorney general’s office are at odds over the AG’s unwritten policy to oppose every innocence case. Regardless of the evidence.

Missourians Against the Death Penalty opposes every execution. A reasonable argument can be made that a civilized society shouldn’t execute, but in a morally corrupt society, choosing our battles matters.

I’m a victim and innocence advocate. In Ernest Johnson’s case, he wasn’t innocent. He wasn’t a victim.

I didn’t want to emulate the attorney general’s office and oppose something for the sake of opposing it, so I apologized to the MADP rep and said I couldn’t advocate on Johnson’s behalf.

Three people were slaughtered. An intellectually disabled man was sentenced to death. No one should be at peace with this, but it was what it was, and I couldn’t advocate on behalf of Ernest Johnson.

Ernest Johnson was executed and pronounced dead on Oct. 5 at 6:11p.m.

Rob Wolverton, a Columbia businessman, sent me a text the same day: “Checking in on you. You doing OK with all of the Earnest Lee Johnson stuff happening?” Followed by: “You are the reason I am against the death penalty.”

I wish my resources were infinite, but I haven’t the requisite tears to shed for the guilty, and I will not conflate or confuse advocating for the guilty with advocating for the innocent. There’s a line of demarcation.

Johnson was guilty, but didn’t need to die

Should I have advocated for Ernest Johnson? I’ve been wrestling with that. He was guilty, but did he need to be executed? Was it humane to execute him?

Legal experts are pretty much unanimous that Johnson’s execution was unconstitutional because of his profound mental disability, probably enough to make him ineligible for the death penalty even before part of his brain was removed to treat a tumor in 2008.

Johnson was guilty, but he didn’t need to be executed. He earned his execution, but he didn’t need the state of Missouri to facilitate his death. He didn’t need to die. Life is sacred. There was no honor in killing him.

I believe in the sanctity of life. I’m as opposed to the death penalty as I am to abortion. The Chris Dunns, Lamar Johnsons, Ken Middletons, Michael Polittes, Keith Carneses, and Kevin Stricklands of the world need me to be. The innocent need me to be. Apparently the disabled need me to be.

As long as mentally disabled and innocent men and women are subject to the same penalties criminally competent, guilty men and women are subject to, there shouldn’t be a moratorium on the death penalty. There should be a permanent suspension of the death penalty.

We can argue until we’re blue in the face about whether the Supreme Court was right about executing those who are clearly guilty but also mentally diminished. We shouldn’t need to argue about whether it’s right to incarcerate or execute innocent men and women.

The United States of America should permanently suspend the death penalty.

Josh Kezer was wrongfully convicted in the 1992 murder of Angela Lawless. He was exonerated in 2009.

This story was originally published October 10, 2021 at 5:00 AM.