Mississippi seeks execution date for man convicted of 1993 murder, lawyers plan SCOTUS appeal

Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch, a Republican, is seeking an execution date for a murderer who has been on death row for 30 years, but his lawyer says the request is premature as the man plans to appeal to the US Supreme Court.

Charles Ray Crawford, 58, was sentenced to death in connection with the kidnapping and murder of 20-year-old community college student Kristy Ray in 1993, according to the Associated Press.

During his 1994 trial, jurors cited a previous rape conviction as an aggravating circumstance when sentencing Crawford, but his lawyers said Monday they would appeal that sentence to the Supreme Court after a lower court ruled against them last week.

Crawford was arrested the day after Ray was kidnapped from his parents’ home and stabbed to death in Tippah County. Crawford told police he blacked out and didn’t remember killing her.

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He was arrested a few days before his expected trial for assaulting another woman by hitting her on the head with a hammer.

The assault trial was adjourned several months before he was convicted. In a separate case, Crawford was found guilty of raping a 17-year-old girl who was friends with the victim of the hammer attack. The victims were in the same place when they were attacked.

Crawford said he also blacked out during those incidents and doesn’t remember hitting him with a hammer or raping.

During part of Crawford’s capital-murder trial in Ray’s death, jurors found the rape conviction “aggravating circumstance” and sentenced him to death, according to court records.

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During part of the sentencing hearing in Crawford’s capital murder case, jurors found his rape conviction “aggravating” and sentenced him to death. (iStock)

In his latest rape plea, Crawford said his former attorneys provided the illegal aid of the insanity defense. He received a psychiatric evaluation at a state hospital, but the trial judge repeatedly refused to allow a psychiatrist or other mental health professional other than the state’s expert to assist in Crawford’s defense, court records show.

On Friday, a majority of the 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Crawford’s appeal.

But the dissenting judges wrote that he found a “poorly prepared and poorly presented defense” and that “it took years for a qualified doctor to conduct a thorough examination of Crawford.” The dissenting judges cited Dr. Siddhartha Nadkarni, the neurologist who examined Crawford.

“Charles was working so hard because of his epilepsy that he did not understand the nature and quality of his actions when he committed the crime,” Nadkarni wrote. “He is a severely brain-injured man (as evidenced by both the history and his neurological examination) who was not in any useful way suffering from epilepsy at the time of the crime.”

The picture shows the gurney of the killing chamber. (AP Photo/Sue Ogrocki, File)

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Crawford’s case has been appealed numerous times using various arguments, which is common in death penalty cases.

Hours after an appeals court rejected Crawford’s latest appeal, Fitch filed papers asking the state Supreme Court to set a date for Crawford’s execution by lethal injection, saying he has “exhausted all federal and state remedies.”

However, attorneys representing Crawford in the Mississippi Office of Post-Conviction Counsel filed papers Monday saying they plan to ask the US Supreme Court to overturn the appeals court’s decision.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.