US to execute intellectually disabled murderer Willie Pye despite mental disability plea

Willie Pye was convicted of kidnapping, raping and murdering his former girlfriend in 1993. Photo / AP

A 59-year-old intellectually disabled murderer is set to be executed today as the US state of Georgia gave the go-ahead for their first execution in over four years.

Willie Pye was convicted of kidnapping, raping and murdering his former girlfriend, Alice Yarbrough, in 1993, and is set to face lethal injection.

Pye’s legal team filed a last-minute plea of clemency, citing that he has an intellectual disability with an IQ of just 68 and a harrowing upbringing riddled with violence, neglect and poverty.

He was sentenced to death in 1996, but his current lawyers argued he received inadequate legal representation during the trial, claiming those working on Pye’s defence at the time as incompetent, “racist and overworked”.

In 2021, an appeals court overturned his sentence due to ineffective council.

However, despite the temporary reprieve, the death sentence was reinstated.

Pye’s fate was sealed this week as the State Board of Pardons and Paroles declined his request for clemency paving the way for the execution.

Defendants who are intellectually disabled are ineligible for execution.

The board had the option to commute Pye’s death sentence to life with or without the possibility of parole, issue a stay or deny clemency altogether.

Pye had been in an on-and-off romantic relationship with Yarbrough, but at the time she was killed, she was living with another man. Pye, Chester Adams and a 15-year-old had planned to rob that man and bought a handgun before heading to a party in a nearby town, prosecutors had said previously.

The trio left the party around midnight and went to the house where Yarbrough lived, finding her alone with her baby. They forced their way into the house, stole a ring and necklace from Yarbrough, and forced her to come with them, leaving the baby alone, according to the prosecutors.

The group drove to a motel, where they raped Yarbrough and then left the motel with her in the car, prosecutors said. They turned onto a dirt road and Pye ordered Yarbrough out of the car, made her lie face down and shot her three times, according to court filings.

Yarbrough’s body was found on November 17, 1993, a few hours after she was killed. Pye, Adams and the teenager were quickly arrested. Pye and Adams denied knowing anything about Yarbrough’s death, but the teenager confessed and implicated the other two.

The teenager reached a plea agreement with prosecutors and was the main witness at Pye’s trial. A jury in June 1996 found Pye guilty of murder, kidnapping, armed robbery, rape and burglary and sentenced him to death.

Pye’s lawyers had argued in court filings that prosecutors relied heavily on the teenager’s testimony but that he later gave inconsistent statements. Such statements, as well as Pye’s testimony during trial, indicate that Yarbrough left the home willingly and went to the motel to trade sex for drugs, the lawyers said in court filings.

Willie Pye’s final meal

Pye has requested a last meal of two chicken sandwiches, two cheeseburgers, french fries, two bags of plain potato chips and two lemon-lime sodas.