The state of Missouri executed Leonard Taylor on Tuesday (Feb. 7) for a 2004 quadruple murder, despite calls from activists and the NAACP, and also that he always maintained his innocence. But frustrated with the execution being carried out, Kent Gipson, Taylor’s lawyer for 11 years, has now spoken out.

On a Feb. 9 episode of SiriusXM’s The Clay Cane Show, attorney Gipson said, “It was a scientific impossibility” that Taylor committed the crime. Gipson explained an affidavit signed by forensic pathologist Jane Turner, said rigor mortis had set in, which wouldn’t be present after seven days when the victims were discovered. This suggests Taylor could not have committed the crimes because he had left for California eight days prior.

On Nov. 26, 2004, Taylor says he flew to Los Angeles, California, to meet his daughter. Eight days later, the bodies of Angela Rowe, 28, her three children, Alexus Conley, 10; and AcQreya Conley, 6; and son Tyrese Conley, 5, were found shot to death in the home they shared with Taylor.

A murder weapon was never found there and there were no eyewitnesses. Autopsies revealed Rowe and her children were killed two to three days before the bodies were found. However, at trial, Phillip Burch, the medical examiner, claimed that based on the temperature in the home, the mother and her children were murdered two to three weeks before the bodies were found.

Gipson also claimed at the original trial Burch changed his testimony and had a history of lying.

“He testified at trial that it [the killings] could have been anything from one to three weeks, which is ridiculous. Interestingly enough, he provided false testimony 30 years ago, in a very celebrated case, where he testified a young mother poisoned her baby,” he explained, referring to the case of Patricia Stalling, a woman who was convicted of murdering her baby in 1991 and was later exonerated. “It turned out he died of a rare genetic disorder. And even when she was exonerated, he refused to admit he was wrong.”

Gipson specifically called out prosecutor Wesley Bell, the first Black prosecutor to be elected in St. Louis County, who said about Taylor before the execution, the “facts are not there to support a credible case of innocence.”

“That's a ridiculous statement,” Gipson responded. “How can you tell us something is credible if you don't hear it? That's why we have courts to resolve credibility questions.” Taylor was executed with an appeal still pending. “If he [Wesley Bell] doesn't think that he [Leonard Taylor] deserves a hearing, then I guess we just put too much faith in some of the things that he campaigned for.

“He actually signed a letter a few years ago with other progressive prosecutors that said something to the effect that in death penalty cases, anytime there's a colorable claim of innocence,” Gipson continued, “we believe that the person ought to be given the chance to prove it. What he did, in this case, is totally the opposite.”

Gipson claimed Bell refused to meet with Taylor’s daughter, 13 at the time of the murder, she said in a sworn statement that her father called Rowe from their location in California.

The day before the execution, Missouri Gov. Mike Parson, a former sheriff, denied clemency for Taylor, calling his claim of innocence “self-serving.” Gipson said Parson needs to educate himself, “about how many innocent people are wrongly convicted and even sentenced to death. I think any fair-minded person looking at the evidence in this case, would conclude that he deserved an opportunity to prove his innocence in a court of law.”

Prosecutors relied heavily on Perry Taylor, Leonard Taylor’s brother (who died in 2015). Perry initially said his brother confessed to him that he killed Angela Rowe and her children. However, Perry recanted at the trial. Gipson said police stalked and threatened Perry with prison time if he didn’t say his brother was the killer. Additionally, Gipson said neighbors saw Rowe alive after Taylor left for California.

Missouri put the 58-year-old to death with the lethal drug pentobarbital.  After the execution, Gerjuan Rowe, one of Angela Rowe’s sisters who supported the execution, told reporters, “Justice is served.”

Gipson said in an interview with his team, that Rowe said she saw her sister alive after Taylor left for California. According to public court documents, that Rowe said she saw her sister on Nov. 27 and received a phone call from her on Nov. 28. A neighbor named Elmer Massey told police “he saw Angela and the children the weekend after Thanksgiving, November 27-28,” court docs read. Again, Southwest airline records prove Leonard Taylor left for California on Nov. 26, the day after Thanksgiving.

While Taylor was convicted of rape in 2000 and had a history of dealing drugs, Gipson insists that was not a reason to execute him for a murder he insists he did not commit. Taylor’s death is Missouri’s third execution in three months. Watch the interview with attorney Kent Gipson below: