Indiana to resume executions as convicted serial killer William Clyde Gibson remains on death row

LOUISVILLE. Ky. (WDRB) -- The state of Indiana will begin executing death row inmates later this year, a move that brought renewed interest in the future of a New Albany serial killer who has lost each of his appeals in front of the state Supreme Court.

In June, Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb and Attorney General Todd Rokita announced the state would resume executions in Indiana prisons. The last execution was in 2009, when convicted murderer Matthew Wrinkles was put to death at the Indiana State Prison in Michigan City.

The first death row inmate to be executed after the announcement will be Joseph Corcoran, who exhausted all his appeals after his conviction in 1997 for the murder of four people. He's scheduled to be put to death Dec. 18.

"We are profoundly disappointed in the setting of the date," Corcoran's attorney recently said. "We strongly believe that there was a means for the Indiana Supreme Court to address the questions raised, especially when we are talking about executing someone who is so profoundly mentally ill, something the attorney general conceded. We will consider our options going forward given the Indiana Supreme Court indicated that there are procedures to raise these issues."

But the state of Indiana said Corcoran doesn't have any appeals left.

Holcomb, speaking at a One Southern Indiana event in New Albany, wouldn't comment on a potential schedule of executions after Corcoran but said there's one other death row inmate who has "exhausted their appeal process."

Indiana Death Row Inmates — Eight men remain on death row in Indiana.

"This was ... resuming what under state law compels us to do," Holcomb said in Louisville on Monday. "And we'll do that. We'll do just that. We'll carry it out It would be dereliction of duty on my part had I not sought the means to carry out the sentence. And so there we are. And we'll get by that day. It's not a day I look forward to, nor do I think anyone would. But we'll do it and we'll do our job and we'll move on."

The state won't confirm who exactly that inmate is, but one of the eight remaining death row inmates will be instantly recognizable to most Louisville-area residents: William Clyde Gibson.

'Cold-blooded killer'

The case rocked a small New Albany neighborhood when, in 2013, Gibson was convicted of killing three women.

Court documents show that, in March 2012, Gibson invited Stephanie Kirk, 35, to his home, where, in an extended attack, he brutally strangled her to death and sexually assaulted her corpse. Gibson hid her naked and broken body in his garage overnight and buried her the next day in a shallow grave in his backyard.

"He's just a sick person," said Tony Kirk, Stephanie's father. "He's pure evil. He's not insane. He's not stupid. He's just a cold-blooded killer."

The following month, the documents show, Gibson invited to his home his late mother's best friend, Christine Whitis, 75, whom he also violently strangled to death before sexually abusing her corpse. He dragged Whitis' nude and lifeless body to the garage, where he severed one of her breasts before leaving for a night out drinking at bars.

Gibson's sisters found Whitis' body the following day and contacted police. Gibson was arrested that evening after a brief car chase. In the vehicle's center console, authorities found Whitis' severed breast.

"You've got be crazy to do some of the things he did," said Mike Whitis, Christine's son. "... He knows he did something very terrible to my mother and Stephanie Kirk, and I think, looking at my eyes ,that reminds him each and every time. That's what I want. I want him to feel that and relive that for as many days as he has left here."

While in custody, Gibson confessed to killing Karen Hodella, whose murder had gone unsolved since police had found her decomposing body in 2003. On Oct. 10, 2002, Gibson told police that the date of Hodella's death — Oct. 10, 2002 — is tattooed on his arm.

Gibson was given a 65-year prison sentence for murdering Hodella and received a death sentence in 2013 for the Whitis murder and in 2014 in the Kirk murder.

He appealed both death sentences, but the Indiana Supreme Court upheld the death sentence in the Whitis murder in 2015 and in the Kirk murder in 2016.

Gibson's most recent appeal was upheld in October 2019 and remains at the Indiana State Prison in Michigan City with seven other death row inmates. His execution date was originally scheduled for 2014.

"I don't think somebody like that needs to be anywhere, but put to death," Tony Kirk said.

In Kentucky, 25 inmates remain on death row 17 years after the last execution. There's been a hold on executions in the state since 2010 over concerns about the inmates' mental health and the state's drug protocol used in lethal injections. Marco Allen Chapman was the last person executed.

According to a recent study by the Death Penalty Information Center, there are more than 2,200 inmates sitting on death row nationwide, with the largest number in California. Twenty-three states have abolished the death penalty.