Execution in Georgia: Man to be put to death for 1993 murder of former girlfriend

A Georgia man is set to be put to death Wednesday evening for the murder of his former girlfriend after a judge denied his last-minute clemency application, authorities said.

Willie James Pye, 59, was convicted in the summer of 1996 for the kidnapping, murder and rape of Alicia Lynn Yarbrough. He is scheduled to be executed using the sedative pentobarbital at 7 p.m. local time, according to the state's Office of the Attorney General. If he's put to death, Pye will be the first person in over four years to be executed in Georgia.

In a clemency application sent to the judge Tuesday, Pye's lawyer said his client regretted the crime and should not undergo lethal injection because he is mentally disabled – something Pye's trial lawyer never told the jury.

“Had defense counsel not abdicated his role, the jurors would have learned that Mr. Pye is intellectually disabled and has an IQ of 68,” Pye’s public defenders wrote, adding that he grew up in an impoverished home and was subjected to "constant violence."

“This is precisely the kind of evidence that supports a life sentence verdict," his lawyers wrote.

The judge denied the request following a closed-door hearing.

What was Willie James Pye convicted for?

Pye, along with Chester Adams and Anthony Freeman, shot and killed Yarbrough after they abducted her and raped her in a motel room in 1993, according to the Georgia Attorney General's Office. They had initially planned to rob the man Yarbrough was living with at the time, but when they discovered she was in the house with her baby, they kidnapped her, court filings said.

According to prosecutors, Pye was upset that another man had signed the birth certificate of Yarbrough's baby, who Pye believed was his.

At the scene of Yarbrough's death, police found Pye's DNA as well as a bullet that a ballistics expert later said was likely fired from a handgun Pye had bought on the street, the attorney general's office said. Pye initially told police he had not seen Yarbrough in two weeks but Freeman confessed and later testified against Pye and Adams, who was sentenced to life in prison.

Appeals and denials

In 1996, a trial court ordered the death sentence after Pye was convicted on malice murder and other charges. Pye filed a motion for a new trial, but it was denied. Two years later, the Georgia Supreme Court denied his appeal and affirmed all his convictions and sentences.

Pye and his lawyers continued to appeal, alleging that Freeman's testimony was inconsistent with other statements he made and that Pye suffered from fetal alcohol syndrome.

In 2021, a panel of the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals granted relief and vacated Pye’s death sentence, agreeing, in part, that his trial lawyer didn’t adequately prepare for the sentencing phase of his trial. However, after a full court review, the appeal's court denied Pye relief. In October, the U.S. Supreme Court denied Pye’s appeal.

If Pye is executed, he will be the 54th inmate in Georgia to be put to death by lethal injection. There have been 75 men and one woman executed in Georgia since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976.

For his last meal, Pye asked for two chicken sandwiches, two cheeseburgers, french fries, two bags of plain potato chips and two lemon-lime sodas, according to the Georgia Department of Corrections.

Contributing: Associated Press