Jeffrey Ferguson Archives

Attorney General issues statement on Ferguson execution

March 26, 2014 By Mike Lear

Missouri’s Attorney General has issued a statement following the execution early this morning of Jeffrey Ferguson at the Eastern Reception, Diagnostic and Correctional Center in Bonne Terre.

In the statement, Chris Koster says, “More than two decades have passed since Jeffrey Ferguson kidnapped, raped, and murdered seventeen-year-old Kelli Hall. While this sentence cannot bring Kelli back, her parents have waited a quarter-century for justice for their daughter. My thoughts and prayers tonight are with Kelli Hall’s family and friends, in the hope that they can now have a degree of closure and finality on this awful crime.”

Agency reports Jeffrey Ferguson has been executed

March 26, 2014 By Mike Lear

A convicted inmate has been executed for the 1989 murder of a St. Louis County teenager.

Jeffrey Ferguson (photo courtesy, Missouri Department of Corrections)

The Missouri Department of Public Safety reports 59-year-old Jeffrey Ferguson has died by a lethal injection of pentobarbital at the Eastern Reception, Diagnostic and Correctional Center in Bonne Terre. The execution was carried out at 12:01 a.m. He was pronounced dead ten minutes later.

Ferguson and another man, Kenneth Ousley, abducted 17-year-old Kelli Hall from the St. Charles gas station she was working at on February 9, 1989. Her body was found three weeks later on a nearby farm. DNA evidence found on Hall’s coat was matched to Ferguson.

Ferguson and Ousley were charged with first degree murder but Ousley pleaded guilty and received a life sentence.

Missourinet will have more information on Ferguson’s execution through the morning.

Governor denies clemency for Ferguson

March 25, 2014 By Mike Lear

Governor Jay Nixon (D) has denied a petition for clemency for convicted inmate Jeffrey Ferguson. Ferguson is scheduled to be executed shortly after midnight for the 1989 murder of Kelli Hall.

Nixon issued the following statement to the media:

“Earlier today, I received from my counsel a final briefing on the petition for clemency from Jeffrey Ferguson, which has been reviewed in detail. After careful deliberation, I have denied this petition. This is a process and a gubernatorial power I do not take lightly. The specific circumstances and set of facts for each case are – and must be – considered on their own.

“Kelli Hall was only 17 when she was abducted from her workplace, raped and brutally murdered. Her life, so full of promise, was brutally taken from her and her family. The jury that convicted Jeffrey Ferguson of Kelli’s murder found that the aggravating circumstances for this crime warranted the death penalty. My decision today upholds that appropriate sentence.

“I ask that the people of Missouri remember Kelli Hall and keep her family in their thoughts and prayers.”

Earlier stories on Jeffrey Ferguson

House rejects attempt to change execution procedure through budget amendment

March 25, 2014 By Mike Lear

Hours before the scheduled execution of convicted inmate Jeffrey Ferguson, the state House has rejected an attempt to change how the Department of Corrections pays for executions.

Representative Jeremy LaFaver (photo courtesy; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

Department Director George Lombardi testfied to a House Committee in February that all those involved in the execution protocol are paid in cash. That includes the maker of execution drugs, who Lombardi confirmed sells the drugs to a Corrections representative in a face-to-face, cash transaction.

See our earlier story on Lombardi’s testimony to a House committee

An amendment offered by Representative Jeremy LaFaver (D-Kansas City) would have prevented the Corrections Department from expending funds from its budget in cash.

“I believe it’s the only department where we allow multi-thousand dollar cash disbursements with virtually no tracking, no ability to track who procured these funds, who spent these funds, on what they spent them,” says LaFaver. “I think it’s a dangerous path to head down.”

House Republicans argued the amendment would halt the execution process in Missouri, and said there is good reason that cash is used to pay those involved in that process.

“The reason they use cash is for the protection of those involved in an execution,” says the Chairwoman of the House Appropriations Committee on Corrections, Marsha Haefner (R-St. Louis). “I think that anyone with any common sense can understand that.”

The amendment was defeated 41-101.

State argues for lifting of impediments to execution of Michael Taylor’s accomplice

March 10, 2014 By Mike Lear

In the days after Michael Taylor was executed for his part in the murder of a 15-year-old girl in 1989, the state is working to lift barriers to the execution of his accomplice.

Roderick Nunley (courtesy; Missouri Department of Corrections)

Taylor and Roderick Nunley participated in the abduction of Ann Harrison and her subsequent rape and murder. Nunley was also sentenced to death and in December his attorneys were asked to give the Supreme Court reason why it shouldn’t set his execution date.

Their primary argument is that he has had a stay in place for more than 3 years in the U.S. District Court in Western Missouri, stemming from an appeal of his death sentence. The Attorney General’s Office has challenged that stay.

Nunley’s attorneys have also asked the court to consider his pending request for the right to appeal a rejected habeas corpus petition, and his role as a plaintiff in a pending court challenge to Missouri’s execution protocol. The four men executed since November were also plaintiffs in that case.

Nunley’s attorneys also maintain that the way those executions were carried out violated state and federal law.

Missouri’s next scheduled lethal injection is that of Jeffrey Ferguson on March 26. Like Nunley and Taylor, Ferguson was sentenced to death for a 1989 murder; that of 17-year-old Kelli Hall in St. Louis County.

State Supreme Court sets execution date for Jeffrey Ferguson

February 21, 2014 By Mike Lear

The state Supreme Court has issued an execution order for 59-year-old Jeffrey Ferguson for the 1989 abduction, rape and murder of 17-year-old Kelli Hall in St. Louis County. The Court has set March 26 as his execution date.

Jeffrey Ferguson (photo courtesy, Missouri Department of Corrections)

Ferguson and another man, Kenneth Ousley, abducted Hall from the St. Charles gas station she was working at on February 9, 1989. Her body was found three weeks later on a nearby farm. DNA evidence found on Hall’s coat was matched to Ferguson.

Ferguson and Ousley were charged with first degree murder but Ousley pleaded guilty and received a life sentence.

See the execution order for Jeffrey Ferguson from the Missouri Supreme Court

The next execution is set to happen early Wednesday morning. 48-year-old Michael Taylor is to receive a lethal injection for another 1989 murder, that of 15-year-old Ann Harrison of Kansas City.

Taylor and Furguson were among four condemned men, the attorneys for whom were ordered by the Court in December to present arguments why it should not set their execution dates. The other two of those four were Roderick Nunley, also involved in the murder of Ann Harrison, and David Barnett, sentenced to death for the murder of his grandparents.

Supreme Court sets execution date for Michael Taylor

January 24, 2014 By Mike Lear

The state Supreme Court has set an execution date for Michael Taylor, one of two men who pleaded guilty to the 1989 murder of a 15-year-old girl. The Court has ordered that he be executed February 26.

Michael Taylor (courtesy; Missouri Department of Corrections)

Taylor and Roderick Nunley both admitted to abducting Ann Harrison from the driveway of her Kansas City home 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.

Taylor turns 47 January 30.

Nunley is also sentenced to death. The Court in December ordered attorneys for Nunley, Taylor and two other condemned men, Jeffrey Ferguson and David Barnett, to present their arguments why it should not set dates for their executions. Taylor is the first of those four to have such a date set. The Corrections Department is set to carry out its next execution Wednesday. Herbert Smulls is 56 and has been on death row for 21 years. He was sentenced to death in 1991 for the fatal shooting of Stephen Honickman, a St. Louis County jewelry store owner.Taylor was to have been executed February 1, 2006, but it was halted while the Supreme Court considered the constitutionality of lethal injection. The Court denied his appeal in 2008.

See the execution order from the Missouri Supreme Court (pdf)

Supreme Court gives four condemned inmates chance to argue against setting of execution dates

December 31, 2013 By Mike Lear

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.

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.