Lawyer Says Life Of 8-Year-Old's Killer Should Be Spared: Reports

COBB COUNTY, GA — A judge temporarily delayed the execution of a Georgia man who was scheduled to die Tuesday for killing an 8-year-old girl in Cobb County 46 years ago, according to reports.

On Monday, Judge Fulton County Superior Court Judge Shermela Williams issued an order temporarily prohibiting the state from proceeding with the execution of 68-year-old Virgil Delano Presnell Jr., reported the Associated Press.

He was scheduled to die at 7 p.m. May 17 by lethal injection at the state prison in Jackson, according to the Georgia Department of Corrections.

Presnell was convicted in August 1976 of abducting and attacking two girls as they walked home from school in Cobb County, just outside Atlanta, on May 4, 1976. He killed the 8-year-old girl and raped her 10-year-old friend.

Presnell’s lawyers filed a lawsuit that alleged the state would violate an agreement that put a hold on executions during the coronavirus pandemic and established conditions under which they could resume. They also said Presnell has severe brain damage stemming from his mother’s heavy drinking while she was pregnant, reported WSB-TV. He also grew up in an abusive family, lawyers said.

After a hearing that lasted more than eight hours, Judge Williams ruled the state needed to temporarily suspend the execution, reported the AP.

According to the AP, the lawsuit filed on behalf of the Federal Defender Program, which represents Presnell, alleges the agreement said that, with one named exception, executions wouldn’t resume until six months after three conditions had been met: the expiration of the state’s COVID-19 judicial emergency, the resumption of normal visitation at state prisons and the availability of a COVID vaccine “to all members of the public.”

On April 25, the state attorney notified Presnell’s attorney, Monet Brewerton-Palmer, that the state intended to seek an execution warrant for him, the lawsuit says. The warrant was issued April 27.

According to the lawsuit obtained by the AP, despite agreement, the attorney general gave Brewerton-Palmer just two days of notice that they intended to set his execution date, despite the agreement. There wasn’t time to adequately prepare for a clemency hearing, reported the AP. There were no witnesses or experts, they reported.

According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, in a clemency request submitted to the parole board, Brewerton-Palmer asked that Presnell’s scheduled execution be delayed three months and ultimately commuted to a life sentence without parole.

The 51-page filing the AJC obtained suggests, they said, that Presnell has severe brain damage stemming from his mother’s alcohol use while she was pregnant. Sexual abuse was “endemic” in Presnell’s family, his lawyer said, and he was raised in an abusive and unstable environment.

It also details his nearly five decades on death row, during which he was routinely raped and beaten at two state prisons, the AJC reported.

Presnell was 22 when he was convicted, but now he is a “quiet, simple old man with a developmental disability who adores his son and his sister,” Brewerton-Palmer said.

If executed, the Georgia man will be the 54th inmate in the state put to death by lethal injection. There are currently 37 men and one woman under the death sentence in Georgia.

Related:

• Execution Date Set For GA Man Convicted Of 1976 Child Rapes, Murder
• Convicted GA Child Murderer Seeks Delay In Execution: Reports
• Time Set For Execution Of GA Man In Murder Of 8-Year-Old Girl