Missouri governor denies clemency, clears way for execution of man convicted of killing girl

ST. LOUIS — Missouri's governor on Monday denied clemency for Christopher Collings, a death row inmate facing execution for sexually assaulting and killing a 9-year-old girl and leaving her body in a sinkhole.

Collings, 49, is scheduled to receive a single injection of pentobarbital at 6 p.m. CST Tuesday at the state prison in Bonne Terre, Missouri, for the 2007 killing of fourth-grader Rowan Ford. It would be the 23rd execution in the U.S. this year and the fourth in Missouri.

''Mr. Collings has received every protection afforded by the Missouri and United States Constitutions, and Mr. Collings' conviction and sentence remain for his horrendous and callous crime,'' Republican Gov. Mike Parson said in a statement.

Parson's decision likely sealed Collings' fate. Earlier Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court denied an appeal on behalf of Collings, without comment. No additional appeals are planned, Collings' attorney, Jeremy Weis, said.

Parson's decision was not unexpected — a former sheriff, Parson has overseen 12 previous executions without granting clemency. Weis said Parson has allowed other executions to proceed for inmates with innocence claims, intellectual disabilities and for men who were ''reformed and remorseful'' for their crimes.

''In each case of redemption, the Governor has ignored the evidence and sought vengeance,'' Weis said in a statement.

Collings confessed to killing Rowan, a child who referred to him as ''Uncle Chris'' after Collings lived for several months with the girl's family in tiny Stella, Missouri. Rowan was killed on Nov. 3, 2007. Her body was found in a sinkhole outside of town six days later. She had been strangled.

''The result was a damaged human being with no guidance on how to grow into a functioning adult,'' the petition stated.

The petition also challenged the fairness of executing Collings when another man charged in the crime, Rowan's stepfather, David Spears, also confessed but was allowed to plead to lesser crimes. Spears served more than seven years in prison before his release in 2015.

Collings told authorities that he drank heavily and smoked marijuana with Spears and another man in the hours before the attack on Rowan, according to court records. Collings said he picked up the sleeping child from her bed, took her to the camper where he lived and assaulted her there. He said he strangled the child with a rope when he realized she recognized him.

Collings told investigators that he took the girl's body to a sinkhole. He burned the rope used in the attack, along with the clothes he was wearing and his bloodstained mattress, prosecutors said.

Spears also implicated himself in the crimes, according to court documents and the clemency petition. A transcript of Spears' statement to police, cited in the petition, said he told police that Collings handed him a cord and that he killed Rowan.

No phone listing could be found for Spears.

The Supreme Court appeal challenged the reliability of the key law enforcement witness at Collings' trial, a police chief from a neighboring town who had four AWOL convictions while serving in the Army. Failure to disclose details about that criminal history at trial violated Collings' right to due process, Weis contended.

''His credibility was really at the heart of the entire case against Mr. Collings," Weis said in an interview.