ATLANTA – Georgia corrections officials have set an execution date next month for a man sentenced to death for killing two real estate agents in suburban Atlanta more than 20 years ago.
Stacey Humphreys, 53, was found guilty of malice murder in the 2003 shooting deaths of Cyndi Williams, 33, and Lori Brown, 21. The Georgia Department of Corrections said he is scheduled to be put to death by lethal injection at 7 p.m. on Sept. 16 at the state prison near Jackson.
If carried out, Humphreys’ execution would be Georgia’s first this year. Capital punishment in the state has been slowed by ongoing litigation over an agreement tied to the coronavirus pandemic, which defense attorneys say temporarily protects many people on death row from execution. Georgia’s most recent execution took place in March 2024.
Humphreys had been scheduled for execution last December, but that date was stopped after his attorneys asked a judge to require two members of the State Board of Pardons and Paroles to step aside from considering his clemency request. His legal team said both board members had conflicts of interest because of roles they held during his trial.
One of those members, Kimberly McCoy, worked at the time of Humphreys’ trial as a victim advocate in the Cobb County district attorney’s office and was assigned to assist the victims in the case. The other, Wayne Bennett, was sheriff in Glynn County, where the trial was moved because of pretrial publicity. Humphreys’ attorneys argued Bennett was responsible for overseeing security for the jurors and for Humphreys during the proceedings.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney paused the execution while reviewing the claims. In March, he ruled that McCoy must recuse herself because she had a “material conflict of interest,” but he concluded Bennett did not have a conflict, noting that Bennett had little memory of the trial.
McBurney also rejected a request from Humphreys’ lawyers to compel the governor to appoint a temporary replacement to the parole board so the clemency petition could be considered by a full five-member panel. The judge also declined to order the board to delay the clemency hearing until such an appointment was made. McBurney said those decisions rested with the governor and the board, though he wrote that they “will no doubt be guided by the finality of the death penalty and the firm tradition of (if not the right to) a five-member deliberative panel in determining how to best proceed” with Humphreys’ case.
Humphreys’ attorneys took the matter to the Georgia Supreme Court, but the justices declined to hear it. They later filed a petition with the U.S. Supreme Court, where the case is still pending.
Humphreys entered a sales office in a model home for a new subdivision in Powder Springs, a suburb about 20 miles (32 kilometers) northwest of Atlanta, around midday on Nov. 3, 2003. The two women worked there as real estate agents, and evidence presented at trial showed that Humphreys forced them to strip naked and give him their bank PINs before fatally shooting them.
Humphreys took the women’s driver’s licenses and bank and credit cards, and withdrew more than $3,000 from their accounts, according to court filings. He told police after his arrest that he had recently taken out some high-interest payday loans and needed money for a payment on his truck.
Humphreys was on parole for a 1993 felony theft conviction at the time and had been released from prison 13 months earlier.
Witnesses told police they saw a man fitting Humphreys’ description at the sales office and a vehicle in the parking lot that matched his black Dodge Durango. Police zeroed in on Humphreys and tried to question him at his Dunwoody home days later. He fled and was arrested in Wisconsin after leading police on a high-speed chase.
He told investigators he didn’t remember his actions at the time of the killings, but when asked why he fled, he said, “I know I did it. I know it just as well as I know my own name,” according to court filings.
Police found a Ruger handgun that matched the 9 mm bullets used to kill the women in the console of the rented Jeep Humphreys used to flee. Blood on the gun matched Williams’ DNA, and blood in Humphreys’ truck matched Brown’s DNA, according to court documents.
