State v. Williams

At the December term, 1923, of the Circuit Court of the City of St. Louis, the appellant and several other negroes were j'ointly indicted for the murder of a white man named Harry Leonard. A severance was granted and the appellant was separately tried in June, 1914, convicted of murder in the first degree, and his punishment assessed at death.

On December 30, 1923, the deceased and his wife kept a soft drink parlor on the corner of Randolph and Twenty-second streets in the city of St. Louis. The room where the business was conducted was on the ground floor of a building, the entrance to which…