The Supreme Court of Georgia will hear arguments Thursday in a 27-year-old former death penalty case from Burke County.
Willie Williams Palmer, 71, was on death row for more than two decades after his 1997 conviction for killing his estranged wife, Brenda Palmer, and teen stepdaughter, Christine Jenkins, in September 1995.
Palmer’s first trial in Burke County ended in a mistrial in 1997. His second trial, held in Washington County, resulted in a 1997 death sentence, but a court reversed the convictions in 2005.
His third trial, in 2007, in Burke County ended in a death sentence, but Palmer was granted a new trial in 2020, with the state agreeing not to seek the death penalty.
Palmer’s current appeal stems from his fourth trial held earlier this year in Burke County. A jury found him guilty of four counts of murder, burglary, kidnapping, cruelty to children and possession of a firearm. Senior Judge Kathy Palmer sentenced him in February to two life sentences without the possibility of parole plus five years.
At the trial, attorneys argued Palmer was a skilled farm worker who was illiterate and dependent on others to perform basic tasks. Palmer had been released from jail despite a protective order barring him from contact with his wife and feared she would take his land in the divorce.
His appeal argues that the 27-year period between his arrest and fourth trial violates his right to a speedy trial, and that the trial court made several errors, including failing to dismiss the case based on the loss or destruction of evidence by the district attorney’s office.
The state is represented by Augusta Circuit District Attorney Jared Williams and Attorney General Chris Carr. Palmer is represented by by Josh D. Moore and Thea Delage of the Georgia Capital Defender’s Office, a unit of the Georgia Public Defender Council.
The court will hear the arguments Thursday at Pierce County High School in the Waycross Judicial Circuit.
