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Thread: Elroy Preston - Missouri

  1. #1
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    Elroy Preston - Missouri

    Facts of the Crime:

    Elroy Preston had been living temporarily with his brother Ervin in the downstairs portion of his house. Ervin was a paraplegic confined to a wheelchair. Pee Wee Richardson and Betty Klien lived together upstairs. On September 21, 1980, all were present in Ervin’s quarters for an evening of heavy drinking. During the course of the night, frequent alcohol-related verbal disputes were exchanged between the three men over petty issues, including who was to sleep where and whether some chicken which had been purchased was to be shared with Pee Wee Richardson. Pee Wee and Betty eventually went upstairs to bed, with Elroy Preston from time to time interrupting their slumber with trips to their room.

    Angry for a continuing assortment of reasons, Preston made a final trip upstairs and ordered Pee Wee and Betty to come back downstairs. In the presence of Ervin and Sherry Brown (Preston’s girlfriend), Preston announced to Pee Wee and Betty that he would kill them just as soon as he removed his clothes. The idea behind the clothes removal was to keep splattered blood off of them. True to his word, Preston removed his clothes and proceeded to stab and critically wound Pee Wee with a hunting knife. Then with a single swipe of the knife he severed Betty’s spinal cord at the neck, killing her instantly. He immediately returned his attention to Pee Wee and stabbed him several more times in the chest and abdomen. Pee Wee died as a result of five stab wounds to the body, face and hands, the latter coming as he tried to ward off the lethal blows. He also absorbed four incised wounds.

    The killings complete, Preston took some left over fried chicken and dipped it in the victims’ blood and ate it with relish, all the while aiming deprecatory remarks at his stone dead victims. With this bizarre bit of action completed, Preston and Sherry Brown dragged the bodies to a back alley and left them there to be discovered by the neighbors. He and Ms. Brown then made some effort to clean the blood spattered house. Elroy Preston was convicted of the capital murder of Pee Wee Richardson and sentenced to death. He was also convicted of second degree-murder for the killing of Betty Klein and given a consecutive life sentence.

    Preston was sentenced to death on July 2, 1982.

  2. #2
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    On September 10, 1996, the US Eight Circuit Court of Appeals denied Preston's habeas petition.

    http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/script...h/953652p.html

    On October 20, 1997, the US Supreme Court denied Preston's certiorari petition.

    http://ohfads.tripod.com/EdnaSMKB.htm

    Preston was scheduled to be executed in November 1997, but received a stay due to brain damage.

    http://72.30.186.176/search/srpcache...cuDKTDu5V5Fg--

  3. #3
    Death row inmate Preston dead

    A state prison inmate under a death sentence for more than 31 years has died at the state prison in Potosi. A court ruling eleven years ago determined that he would always be under a death sentence but never be executed.

    Elroy Preston, his paraplegic brother Ervin, Preston’s girlfriend, and another couple, PeeWee Richardson and girlfriend Betty Klein, had been drinking extensively one night in 1980 in St. Louis when they argued about whether Richardson could have some fried chicken. Elroy Preston told Richardson and Klein he was going to kill them as soon as he took off his clothes so he wouldn’t get blood on them. He stabbed Richardson five times and nearly beheaded Klein.

    Testimony later showed he then took some of the chicken, dipped it in their blood, and ate it enthusiastically.

    Preston was scheduled for execution on January 28, 1998. But then-Corrections Director Dora Shriro notified Governor Carnahan that Preston no longer had the mental capacity to understand the nature and purpose of the punishment. State law requires condemned inmates to have that capacity.

    Carnahan issued a stay five days before the execution and ordered that it continue until it could be determined that Preston was again competent to be executed. A circuit judge in Washington County ruled in 2002 that he was not mentally competent.

    Preston never regained that capability. He was 59 when he died this morning at the prison where he was to have been executed almost sixteen years ago.

    http://www.missourinet.com/2013/12/0...-preston-dead/
    Last edited by GregFromSanJose; 12-07-2013 at 02:12 AM.

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