Just In: Christopher Wilkins Executed After 9 Years on Death Row | The Texas Fort Double Murder

On January 31st, 2017, after spending nearly 19 years on death row, Mark Anthony Christeson was executed by lethal injection at the Eastern Reception, Diagnostic, and Correction Center in Bon Terre, Missouri. He was 37 years old. In this video, we will talk about what happened, his final words, and his final meal.

But to uncover the events of that fateful day and why Mark ended up being executed, we have to go back to a deeply troubled teenager in 1998 and a childhood so horrific that it would challenge everything we think we know about justice, mental capacity, and the American legal system. Mark Anthony Christeson was born on February 20th, 1979 in rural Missouri.

From the moment he entered this world, Mark’s life was marked by unspeakable trauma and abuse. His childhood was a nightmare that should never be endured. Mark lived with his mother, Linda, and William Christeson, a diagnosed pedophile who had molested multiple family members. Family counseling records revealed something disturbing.

From birth, William chose to sleep with Mark rather than his wife. Mark endured abuse from his earliest days by the man who was supposed to protect him. Linda was institutionalized repeatedly for depression and attempted suicide. She had an unhealthy dependence on Mark’s older brother, Billy, while completely rejecting Mark, showing him no love or maternal care.

Mark’s biological father, Johnny, was also institutionalized for psychiatric disorders. This was the genetic and environmental lottery Mark was born into. Mark was placed in special education and remained there throughout his schooling, receiving primarily failing grades. Take his IQ scores dropped dramatically over time.

In elementary school, he tested low average. By middle school, he had fallen to the first percentile. Something was happening to his brain. Deteriorating, and nobody noticed or cared. Later evaluations revealed Mark’s mental impairment was due to chemical exposure in utero, several severe concussions, and the ongoing abuse he suffered.

His brain was literally damaged from external trauma and the toxic stress of constant mistreatment. After William died, Mark was removed from his mother’s custody and placed with his cousin, David Bolin. The nightmare continued. David Bolin made his income from renting trailers on his rural property near Vichy, Missouri, and taking in custody of children from family members.

The area was known as Bolin Hill, infamous for violent fights, drug trafficking, its extreme poverty, and incest. David was another predator. Mark became a victim of molestation again, just as he had been victimized by William. Family members reported that David spent every night in Mark’s bed. Mark ran away repeatedly trying to escape, but he had nowhere to go, no one to turn to, no safe place.

He would be brought back to Bolin Hill, back to the abuse, back to the poverty and violence. This was Mark’s life for 7 years of continuous mistreatment by the man who was supposed to be his caretaker. By February 1998, Mark’s IQ had dropped into 74, borderline intellectual disability. He struggled to understand abstract concepts, to plan for the future, to grasp consequences.

Mark had spent his entire youth being beaten and neglected. His brain was damaged. His capacity for emotional regulation was non-existent. And he had never received mental health treatment, therapy, or intervention. He was a severely damaged young man with no ability to process trauma, no coping mechanisms, and no understanding of how to function in the world.

Jesse Carter was also living at David Bolin’s house. Jesse had his own troubled background, though not as severe as Mark’s. The two cousins bonded over their shared misery and desperation to escape. In late January 1998, they planned to run away, steal a vehicle, and drive to California to start new lives where nobody could hurt them anymore.

Living half a mile away was Susan Brooke, a hard-working single mother raising her daughter Adrian and son Kyle. Susan was a devoted mother who worked in production at a local industry. She lived in a modest home in rural Maries County near Vichy, Missouri, and a quiet area where people knew their neighbors and looked out for one another.

On Saturday, January 31st, 1998, Mark Christeson and Jesse Carter began planning their escape. They decided they would take Susan Brooke’s Ford Bronco. It’s unclear whether they initially intended to harm the Brookes or if the plan was simply to steal the vehicle. But what is clear is that Mark and Jesse prepared for violence.

They each took shotguns from David Bolin’s house. They brought along shoelaces to use as restraints. They were ready for whatever might happen. Sunday morning, February 1st, 1998, David Bolin left for work early in in morning, leaving Mark and Jesse alone at the house. This was their chance. The two teenagers grabbed their shotguns and walked the half mile to Susan Brookes’ home.

They hid outside for a few minutes, watching the house, but gathering their courage. Then they entered through an unlocked door. Inside the house, 12-year-old Adrian and 9-year-old Kyle were sitting on the living room floor, probably watching television or playing. They looked up and saw two young men with shotguns standing in their home.

Can you imagine the terror those children must have felt in that moment? Susan Brookes came in from the kitchen and encountered Jessie Carter binding her children’s hands with the shoelaces he had brought. She immediately understood the danger her family was in. Mark Christison pointed his shotgun at Susan and ordered her into her daughter’s bedroom.

Susan complied, trying not to escalate the situation, trying to protect her children. But Mark had other plans. In Adrian’s bedroom, on Adrian’s bed, um Mark Christison raped Susan Brookes at gunpoint while her children were in the next room, bound and terrified. The sexual violence that Mark had suffered his entire life, he now inflicted on an innocent woman.

The trauma that had been done to him, he passed on to someone else. When Mark brought Susan back out to the living room, Jessie Carter bound her hands behind her back with yellow rope. Susan, trying desperately to end this nightmare, said to them, “You had your fun. Now get out.” She thought maybe if she just let them leave, if she didn’t resist, they would take what they wanted and go.

She was wrong. At some point during this confrontation, Mark or Jessie struck Susan and Kyle in the head with a blunt object. Then came the moment that sealed the fate of the entire Brookes family. 12-year-old Adrian recognized Jesse Carter. When she said his nickname out loud, J.R. Then she said his full name, Jesse Carter.

The teenagers panicked. They had been recognized. Mark turned to Jesse and said the words that would haunt this case forever. We got to get rid of them. What happened next was not a heat-of-the-moment decision. It was not a panic-driven mistake. What Mark Christison and Jesse Carter did next was calculated, methodical, and utterly depraved.

They forced Susan, Adrian, and Kyle into the backseat of Susan’s Ford Bronco. Then they went through the house and loaded up everything of value they could find. The television, the VCR, the car stereo, a video game player, Susan’s checkbook, and various other small items. They were robbing this family even as they prepared to murder them.

Mark got into the driver’s seat and drove the Bronco away from the house. Um he drove down the highway, turned onto a gravel road, then drove across a neighbor’s field to a pond at the edge of a wooded area. This was a deliberate choice. Mark was taking them somewhere remote, somewhere they wouldn’t be found, somewhere he could do what he needed to do without being interrupted.

At the pond, Mark and Jesse forced Susan and her children out of the Bronco and down to the bank of the water. Susan knew what was about to happen. She knew these young men were going to kill her and her children, but she was helpless to stop it. Mark Christison kicked Susan Brookes just below her ribs with enough force that she was knocked to the ground.

Then he placed his foot on her midsection, pinning her down, reached down with a bone knife, and cut her throat. Blood poured from Susan’s neck. She was bleeding profusely, and her life draining away onto the muddy bank of the pond. But the cut wasn’t deep enough to kill her immediately. Susan Brooke, lying there dying with blood soaking into the ground beneath her, looked at her children and told them she loved them.

Those were the last words Adrian and Kyle would ever hear from their mother. Then Mark turned his attention to 9-year-old Kyle. He grabbed the little boy, cut his throat twice with the bone knife, and held him under the water of the pond until he drowned. Kyle thrashed and struggled, his small body fighting desperately for air, but Mark held him down until the struggling stopped.

Then Jesse Carter pushed Kyle’s body farther out into the pond so it would sink. Mark told Jesse to go to a nearby barn and get cinder blocks. They were going to weigh down the bodies. While Jesse was gone, then Mark fired a shot from one of the shotguns. When Jesse returned with the cinder blocks, he found Mark struggling with 12-year-old Adrian, who was trying to free herself, trying to run, trying to survive.

Jesse Carter held Adrian’s feet while Mark Christison pressed down on her throat until she suffocated. A 12-year-old girl fighting for her life while two teenage boys strangled her to death. When Adrian finally stopped moving, Jesse pushed her body into the pond. Susan Brooke was still alive, barely breathing, bleeding out on the bank, but still alive.

She had just watched both of her children murdered in front of her. Mark and Jesse grabbed her body, Mark holding her arms and Jessie holding her legs and they threw her into the pond on top of her children’s bodies. Susan Brooke drowned there in that pond and lying on top of Adrian and Kyle. Her last moments spent in the water with her murdered children.

Jesse Carter went into the woods and found a long stick. He used it to push all three bodies farther out into the pond making sure they would sink. Making sure they wouldn’t be found easily. Then Mark got back into the Bronco and drove away like nothing had happened. They drove back to Bolin Hill and parked the Bronco near a garbage pile on David Bolin’s property.

They took one of the shotguns back into the house. Loaded their personal belongings into an old Oldsmobile. Then transferred everything to the Bronco. At that point they drove off. Heading west on Interstate 44. They were going to California. They were going to start their new lives. And they were leaving behind three bodies floating in a pond.

As Mark and Jessie drove west toward their new freedom. The Brooke family was beginning to worry. Susan’s sister Kay Hayes thought it was unusual that Susan and her children didn’t come to Sunday dinner as planned. But she wasn’t immediately concerned. Maybe something had come up. Maybe Susan had forgotten. But by Tuesday evening when Kay called Susan’s home and got no answer, she started to worry.

She called another sister Joy LeMoyne to ask if she had heard from Susan. Joy hadn’t. On Wednesday evening family members went to Susan’s house to check on her. What they found was disturbing. Susan’s prescription glasses were still in the house. The children’s coats and Susan’s coat were still there. But the television, the VCR, and the Bronco were gone.

Something was very wrong. They called the police. That night, officers from the Maries County Sheriff’s Department secured the home and began searching the premises. The next morning, Thursday, February 5th, 1998, Missouri State Highway Patrol officers conducted an aerial search in a helicopter. They spotted a body floating in a pond located slightly southeast of the Brookes residence.

When they landed and investigated, they found the bodies of Susan, Adrian, and Kyle partially submerged in the water. The scene was horrific. The officers found a 16-gauge shotgun shell on the south bank of the pond. They found leaves and soil splattered with blood. They found shoe impressions and two cinder blocks on the west bank near where the bodies had been recovered.

And they found tire impressions leading from the pond back to the garbage pile on David Bolin’s property and where Mark and Jesse had parked the Bronco. The autopsies revealed the full horror of what had been done to this family. The medical examiner determined that the cuts to Susan Brookes neck were not severe enough to cause immediate death.

She had died from drowning. Both Susan and Kyle had hemorrhaging and bleeding under the scalp indicating they had been struck in the head with a blunt object. Kyle had two superficial cuts across his neck, but he too had died from drowning. Adrian had died from suffocation, and she also had a small puncture wound in her left arm that appeared to be from a shotgun pellet.

DNA testing performed by the Missouri State Highway Patrol Crime Labora- laboratory established that genetic material from semen recovered from Susan Brooks body and from Adrian’s sheets match Mark Christeson’s genetic profile. What he had raped Susan and the evidence proved it. Firearms identification testing established conclusively that the 16-gauge shotgun shell found at the pond had been fired from a shotgun that would later be traced back to Mark Christeson.

Meanwhile, Mark and Jesse were driving across the country. As they traveled, they sold items from Susan Brooks home to pay for gas and food. They pawned the television, the VCR, the car stereo. Mark even pawned the 16-gauge shotgun at a pawn shop in Amarillo, Texas. They had no idea that back in Missouri the bodies had been discovered and law enforcement was searching for them.

The two teenagers made it all the way to California. They drove through Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and into the Golden State. And remarkably, they they were stopped by police three times during their journey and let go each time. In Shamrock, Texas, a police chief pulled them over because they had temporary license tags.

But Mark and Jesse had no criminal records and the Bronco hadn’t been reported stolen yet. So the officer had no reason to detain them. In New Mexico, a sheriff’s deputy stopped and helped them when the vehicle broke down. He checked their license licenses and plates and let them go. The all-points bulletin for the pair was issued later after these encounters because the murders hadn’t been discovered until several days after they occurred.

On February 9th, 1998, 8 days after the killings, a detective with the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department in Blythe, California I recognized Mark Christeson and Jesse Carter from their photographs on a wanted flyer that had been circulated by law enforcement. Later that day, the fugitives were arrested. Mark and Jessie were extradited back to Missouri to face charges.

The evidence against them was overwhelming. The DNA evidence, the shotgun, the tire tracks, the stolen property they had pawned along the way. And most damning of all, Jessie Carter agreed to cooperate with prosecutors and testify against Mark in exchange for a plea deal. Jessie Carter confessed to his role in the crimes.

 He described in detail how Mark had cut Susan Brook’s throat, how Mark had drowned Kyle, how Mark had strangled Adrian while Jessie held her feet. He testified that it was Mark who made the decision to kill the Brooks. Mark who carried out most of the violence, and Mark who was in control the entire time. In exchange for his testimony, Jessie Carter was allowed to plead guilty and receive a sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole.

He would never be free again, but he would avoid the death penalty. And at 17 years old, he decided that was a deal worth taking. Mark Christeson went to trial in September 1999 in Vernon County Circuit Court. The case had been moved from Maries County on a change of venue. The trial was presided over by Judge C.

David Darnold. And despite the overwhelming evidence against him, Mark Christeson took the witness stand and denied his involvement in the murders. Mark’s defense was shocking in its audacity. He testified that he had a secret sexual relationship with Susan Brook. He claimed that at about noon on Saturday, January 31st, 1998, the day before the murders, he had consensual sex with Susan on Adrian’s bed.

He said that was how his DNA ended up on the sheets and on Susan’s body. Then he claimed that on the morning of February 1st, Jesse Carter stole Susan Brookes’ Bronco and asked Mark to run away with him. And that Mark agreed simply because he wanted to run away, too. According to Mark’s testimony, he had nothing to do with the murders.

 It was all Jesse Carter. The jury didn’t believe him. How could they? The evidence was overwhelming. The DNA, the testimony from Jesse Carter, the physical evidence from the crime scene, the stolen property that Mark himself had pawned. Everything pointed to Mark being not just involved, but the primary perpetrator. But Mark’s defense team was working under impossible conditions.

They were trying to defend a client who had confessed to his cousin, who had left DNA evidence at the crime scene, and who had pawned the murder weapon. And more importantly, they didn’t have the resources to properly investigate Mark’s background, his mental health, his cognitive disabilities. The trial moved into the penalty phase, where the jury would decide whether Mark should be sentenced to death or life in prison.

The state brought in witnesses to paint Mark as a dangerous, violent predator. One of those witnesses was Mike Wagner, a man who had been incarcerated with Mark at the Vernon County Jail while Mark was awaiting trial. Wagner testified that in February 1999, Mark had sodomized him while they shared a cell. This was presented as evidence of Mark’s continued violent and predatory behavior, even while in custody.

And the state also called Joy LeMoin, Susan Brookes’ younger sister, who gave victim impact and testimony. She described the devastation the murders had caused the family. She talked about Susan as a devoted mother, about Adrian as a bright and loving child, about Kyle as a sweet and innocent little boy. She described how the family had lost everything that day at the pond.

Mark’s defense team tried to present mitigating evidence. They called Mark’s mother, his aunt, and his former girlfriend. Each of them testified about Mark’s difficult, abusive, and unhappy upbringing. They tried to explain the horror of Mark’s childhood, the sexual abuse, the neglect, the poverty. They called a psychologist named Dr.

Wanda Draper, who confirmed that Mark had several unresolved traumatic experiences from his childhood. But here’s the problem. The defense had almost no money to conduct a proper investigation. They couldn’t afford comprehensive psychological testing. They couldn’t afford to bring in experts on childhood trauma and sexual abuse.

They couldn’t afford to fully document the extent of Mark’s cognitive disabilities and brain damage. They did the best they could with the limited resources they had, but it wasn’t enough. The jury found Mark guilty on all three counts of first-degree murder. Then they moved to the question of sentencing. The jury found four aggravating circumstances in Susan Bowden’s murder.

That it was committed during the unlawful homicide of her daughter Adrian. That it was committed during the unlawful homicide of her son Kyle. That it was committed during the perpetration of rape, or and that it involved depravity of mind and was outrageously and wantonly vile, horrible, and inhuman. For the murders of Adrian and Kyle, the jury found three aggravating circumstances.

That the murders were committed during the unlawful homicide of their mother. That they were committed during the unlawful homicide of each other. And that the murders involved a depravity of mind and were outrageously and wantonly vile, horrible, and inhuman. On October 8th, 1999, the jury returned with their recommendation, death, death, death.

Three death sentences, one for each victim. On October 14th, 1999, Judge Donald formally imposed the sentences in accordance with the jury’s recommendation. Mark Anthony Christeson, at age 20, was transported to death row at the Potosi Correctional Center to await execution. The Missouri Supreme Court reviewed the case on direct appeal, as required for all death penalty cases.

In June 2001, they issued their decision affirming the conviction and sentence. The court found no errors in the trial proceedings. The court found that the evidence supported the jury’s verdicts. The court found that the death sentences were not excessive or disproportionate. Mark’s first appeal was denied.

Mark filed a second appeal with the Missouri Supreme Court in 2004. That appeal was also denied. By this point, Mark had exhausted his state court appeals. His only remaining option was to file a federal habeas corpus petition, a last-ditch effort to challenge his conviction and sentence in federal court. And this is where the case takes a turn that exposes some of the deepest flaws in America’s death penalty system.

In 2004, though a US District Court judge appointed two St. Louis area attorneys to represent Mark in preparing his federal habeas petition. Their names were Eric Butts and Philip Horwitz. These attorneys were supposed to be Mark’s last hope, his final chance to have someone advocate for him and raise all the issues that hadn’t been properly addressed at trial.

Under the Anti-terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, commonly known as AEDPA, Mark had exactly 1 year from the date his state appeals were exhausted to file his federal habeas petition. The deadline was April 10th, 2005. If he missed that deadline, he would lose his right to federal review forever.

And for someone with an IQ of 74, someone with documented brain damage and cognitive disabilities, understanding this deadline and making sure his lawyers filed on time was impossible. But Mark trusted his lawyers. He believed they were working on his case, preparing his petition, doing everything necessary to protect his rights.

But Eric Butts and Philip Horwitz didn’t even meet with Mark until more than 6 weeks after the deadline had already passed. By the time they finally sat down with their client for the first time, his right to federal review had already been lost. The attorneys eventually filed Mark’s federal habeas petition on August 5th, 2005.

It was 117 days late, almost 4 months late. And under AEDPA’s strict rules, that meant the petition was procedurally barred. Mark had lost his one and only chance at federal habeas review because his court-appointed attorneys had missed the deadline. When this catastrophic error came to light, Eric Butts and Philip Horwitz refused to cooperate with efforts to fix it.

 And they kept the information from Mark, their developmentally disabled client, for years. They concealed their own failure and let Mark continue believing he might still have a chance at federal review. Eventually, other attorneys learned about the missed deadline and tried to help Mark. They filed a motion arguing that Mark should be granted equitable tolling, which would allow the late-filed petition to be considered despite the missed deadline.

But here’s the problem. To argue for equitable tolling, Mark’s new lawyers had to explain why the deadline was missed. And the reason it was missed was because Eric Butts and Philip Horwitz had failed to do their jobs. But Eric Butts and Philip Horwitz were still Mark’s attorneys of record. So, the court was asking these same attorneys, the ones who had caused the problem, when to argue that they had caused the problem and that Mark shouldn’t be punished for their failure.

The US Supreme Court would later find that this created an obvious and insurmountable conflict of interest. Advancing a claim for equitable tolling would require Butts and Horwitz to denigrate their own performance, to admit their own incompetence, to potentially expose themselves to professional discipline and mal- practice claims.

They weren’t going to do that. So, Mark’s argument for equitable tolling failed. In October 2014, Mark was scheduled to be executed. But just hours before he was set to die, the United States Supreme Court granted a stay of execution. The court ruled that Mark was entitled to new attorneys, free from the conflict of interest that had plagued his case.

Finally, it seemed and Mark might get the federal review he had been denied. New lawyers were appointed to represent Mark. They immediately began investigating his background and his mental health trying to uncover the mitigating evidence that should have been presented at trial but never was. They requested funding for comprehensive psychological evaluations, expert witnesses, and investigators.

They needed to build the case that Mark’s trial lawyers had never built. But the district court approved only 6% of the requested budget. 6% Mark’s new attorneys stated publicly that they never had the resources to have medical professionals properly examine Mark to determine the full extent of his cognitive limitations, his brain damage, and his mental health issues.

Despite these obstacles Mark’s new attorneys managed to uncover some of the horrific details of his childhood that we’ve discussed today. They found the family counseling records documenting that William Christeson, a diagnosed pedophile, had slept with infant Mark instead of his wife. They found evidence of the ongoing sexual abuse by David Bolin.

They documented Mark’s IQ of 74 and his placement in special education throughout his schooling. But the courts ruled that this evidence came too late. The district court set an expedited briefing schedule and ruled against Mark on all of his claims. The 8th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed. Mark’s last chance at federal review the review he should have received years earlier if his lawyers had simply filed on time ended in defeat.

 Um Mark Anthony Christeson became the first person executed in Missouri since 1989 to have had no meaningful federal appellate review of his conviction and sentence. The system had failed him at every level. His trial lawyers didn’t have adequate funding to investigate and present mitigating evidence. His federal habeas lawyers missed the filing deadline by 4 months.

 And when new lawyers finally tried to raise the issues that should have been raised all along, they were told it was too late. The case attracted national attention. Legal experts and human rights organizations pointed to Mark’s case as an example of everything wrong with America’s death penalty system. A man with an IQ of 74, someone who had been sexually abused from infancy, someone with documented brain damage, as it was about to be executed without ever having his case properly reviewed by a federal court.

But the state of Missouri moved forward with execution plans. On October 12th, 2016, the Missouri Supreme Court issued an execution warrant for January 31st, 2017. This was the second time since 2014 that Missouri had set an execution date while Mark’s attorneys were still actively litigating his right to federal appeals.

Mark’s lawyers filed emergency appeals with every court that would listen. They argued that executing someone who had never received federal habeas review violated due process. They argued that Mark’s intellectual disabilities made him ineligible for execution under Supreme Court precedent. They argued that the catastrophic failures of his court-appointed attorneys should not cost Mark his life.

Every court denied relief. Like the district court, the 8th Circuit, the United States Supreme Court, and Missouri’s Republican Governor, Eric Greitens, denied Mark’s clemency petition without comment. January 31st, 2017, Mark Anthony Christeson woke up knowing this was his last day on Earth. He had spent nearly 19 years on death row from age 20 to age 37.

His entire adult life had been spent in a cell waiting to die. For his last meal, Mark requested a bacon cheeseburger, french fries, a slice of pecan pie, and a soda. Simple comfort food. The kind of meal a child might ask for. Mark spent his final day visiting with his brother and sister-in-law. The only family members who had stood by him through all of this.

They were the only people who still saw him as a human being. As someone worthy of love despite the terrible things he had done. Um at some point during that final day, Mark was asked if he wanted to make a final statement. He prepared a few words to say to his family to let them know he loved them. Shortly after 6:00 p.m.

, Mark’s final appeals were denied. There would be no last-minute stay, no intervention from the governor, no miracle. Mark Christerson was going to die. The execution was scheduled for after 7:00 p.m. Mark was escorted from his holding cell to the execution chamber. He was strapped to a gurney, his arms extended, IV lines inserted into both arms.

The witnesses gathered. Among them was Harley Brook, the half-sister of Adrian and Kyle, who had come to watch Mark die. Maricopa County Sheriff Chris Heitman was there as an official state witness. And Mark’s brother and sister-in-law were there to support Mark in his final moments.

 And the warden asked Mark if he had any final words. Mark turned his head toward his family members and spoke. His voice was clear. “To let my family know I love them with all my heart, and I’m more than blessed to have them in my life, Mark said. And thank God for such an amazing family. Those were his final words. Not a proclamation of innocence, not an apology to the victim’s family, just a simple expression of gratitude to the people who had loved him despite everything.

At 6:57 p.m., the lethal injection began. Mark appeared to mouth the words, “I love you” a couple of times to the people gathered to watch on his behalf. Then his eyes closed, his breathing slowed, his body went still. At 7:05 p.m., 8 minutes after the lethal injection began, Mark Anthony Christeson was pronounced dead. He was 37 years old.

 So, the execution of Mark Christeson raises profound questions about justice, about mental capacity, about the role of childhood trauma in violent crime, and about the fairness of America’s death penalty system. There is no question that what Mark did to Susan, Adrian, and Kyle Brook was monstrous. Three innocent people lost their lives in the most horrific way imaginable.

Susan was raped and forced to watch her children die before she herself was thrown into a pond to drown. Adrian and Kyle, just 12 and 9 years old, were murdered simply because Adrian recognized one of her killers. The Brook family’s suffering cannot be minimized or excused. But the question that haunts this case is whether Mark Christeson, with his IQ of 74, his documented brain damage, and his history of severe childhood sexual abuse, in had the mental capacity to truly understand the wrongfulness of his actions and to form the kind of culpable

mental state that justifies the ultimate punishment of death. The Supreme Court has held that the Eighth Amendment prohibits executing people with intellectual disabilities. In Atkins versus Virginia, decided in 2002, the court ruled that such executions constitute cruel and unusual punishment. But Mark’s case fell into a gray area.

His IQ of 74 was just above the typical cutoff for intellectual disability, which is usually 70 or below. And because his trial lawyers didn’t have adequate resources, and because his federal habeas lawyers missed the filing deadline, the full extent of Mark’s cognitive limitations was never properly investigated or presented to a court.

We will never know what a comprehensive psychological evaluation, may conducted by well-funded experts with adequate time and resources, would have revealed about Mark’s mental capacity. We will never know whether a jury, presented with the full story of Mark’s childhood sexual abuse, his brain damage, and his cognitive disabilities, would have sentenced him to death.

What we do know is that Mark Christeson was failed by the system at every turn. Failed by his family, who abused him from infancy. Failed by the child welfare system, which placed him with another abuser when he was removed from his mother’s custody. Failed by the school system, which documented his declining cognitive abilities, but never got him proper help.

Failed by his trial lawyers, who didn’t have adequate funding to investigate his background. Failed by his federal habeas lawyers, who missed the filing deadline. And failed by the courts, which found that all of this evidence of incompetence and inadequacy came too late to matter. Mark’s cousin, Jesse Carter, is still alive.

He is serving life without parole at a Missouri prison. He was 17 when he participated in these murders. He held Adrian Brooke’s feet while Mark strangled her. He helped throw Susan Brooke’s body into the pond. He used a stick to push the bodies farther into the water. And he is still alive while Mark is dead. The difference? Jesse agreed to testify against Mark and took a plea deal.

And perhaps more importantly, Jesse didn’t have an IQ of 74. Jesse didn’t have the same level of cognitive disability. Jesse was able to understand the legal process, to make informed decisions about his defense, to cooperate with his attorneys in a way that Mark simply couldn’t. Some people believe Mark’s execution was justice.

They believe that the horror of his crimes was so great that no amount of childhood trauma or cognitive disability could excuse what he did. They believe that Susan, Adrian, and Kyle deserved justice. And that Mark’s death was the only appropriate response to their murders. Others believe Mark’s execution was a profound injustice.

They believe that executing someone with an IQ of 74, someone who had been sexually abused from infancy, someone who never received adequate legal representation, violates our most basic principles of justice and human dignity. What is clear is that three people are dead because of Mark Christeson and Jesse Carter.

Susan Jo Brooke, 36 years old, a devoted single mother, was raped, slashed with a knife, and drowned in a pond. Adrian Brooke, 12 years old, and a bright and loving girl, was strangled to death. Kyle Brueck, 9 years old, a sweet and innocent boy, had his throat cut and was drowned. They left behind grieving family members whose lives were shattered by this crime.

And it is also clear that Mark Anthony Christeson was a victim long before he became a perpetrator. He was victimized from birth by a pedophile father. He was victimized by a neglectful mother. He was victimized by a cousin who was supposed to care for him, but instead sexually abused him for 7 years. He was victimized by a system that documented his cognitive decline, but never intervened.

And ultimately, he was victimized by a legal system that denied him the federal review that every death row inmate is supposed to receive. On January 31st, 2017, the state of Missouri executed a man who had never had his case properly reviewed by a federal court. A man with an IQ of 74. A man who had been sexually abused for virtually his entire childhood.

Whether that execution was justice or injustice, whether Mark Christeson deserved to die or deserved a chance at a meaningful review of his case, these are questions that will continue to be debated. The case of Mark Anthony Christeson is now closed. A childhood of unspeakable abuse. Three brutal murders. Nearly 19 years on death row.

A legal system that failed him at every level. And finally, on a cold January evening in 2017, a needle in the arm and a quiet goodbye to his family. Justice, such as it is, was served.