The state Supreme Court has issued orders to four men sentenced to death to have presented to the Court their arguments why it shouldn’t set dates for their executions. The state Supreme Court has issued show cause orders to Roderick Nunley, Michael Taylor, Jeffrey Ferguson and David Barnett.

The Supreme Court has issued show cause orders to (from left) Michael Taylor, Roderick Nunley, Jeffrey Ferguson and David Barnett, all sentenced to death in Missouri.

The Supreme Court has issued show cause orders to (from left) Michael Taylor, Roderick Nunley, Jeffrey Ferguson and David Barnett, all sentenced to death in Missouri.

Nunley and Taylor both pleaded guilty to first-degree murder for the 1989 killing of 15-year-old Ann Harrison after abducting her from the Kansas City bus stop where she was waiting to go to school. Taylor had raped the girl with Nunley’s help in the basement of Nunley’s mother’s home, before fatally stabbing her and abandoning her body in the trunk of a car.

Ferguson was convicted of first-degree murder for killing 17-year-old Kelli Hall, who he and another man had abducted from the St. Charles gas station she was working at in 1989.

David Barnett stabbed each of his grandparents more than 10 times at their Glendale home before stealing their car and 120-dollars in cash.

The orders signed by Chief Justice Mary Rhodes Russell mean those mens’ attorneys must present arguments why the Supreme Court should not set dates for their executions by January 10.

One execution is already scheduled for January 29 for Herbert Smulls, convicted of the the 1991 murder of a Chesterfield jeweler.