Georgia sets execution date for man convicted of killing two real estate agents in 2003

ATLANTA (AP) — Prison officials in Georgia have scheduled an execution later this month for a man convicted of fatally shooting two real estate agents in Atlanta’s suburbs two decades ago.

Stacey Humphreys is scheduled to be put to death at 7 p.m. on Dec. 19, according to the Department of Corrections. Humphreys was convicted of malice murder in the 2003 killings of 33-year-old Cyndi Williams and 21-year-old Lori Brown.

Humphreys, 52, would be the first person executed in Georgia this year.

Humphreys entered a sales office in a model home for a new subdivision in Powder Springs, a suburb about 20 miles (32 kilometers) northwest of Atlanta, around midday on Nov. 3, 2003. The two women worked there as real estate agents, and evidence presented at trial showed that Humphreys forced them to strip naked and give him their bank PINs before fatally shooting them and taking their driver’s licenses and bank and credit cards.

Humphreys was on parole for a 1993 theft felony theft conviction at the time and had been released from prison 13 months earlier.

Witnesses told police they saw a man fitting Humphreys’ description at the sales office and a vehicle in the parking lot that matched his black Dodge Durango. Police zeroed in on Humphreys and tried to question him at his Dunwoody home days later. He fled and was arrested in Wisconsin after leading police on a high-speed chase.

Police found a Ruger handgun that matched the 9 mm bullets used to kill the women in the console of the rented Jeep Humphreys used to flee. Blood on the gun matched Williams’ DNA, and blood in Humphreys’ truck matched Brown’s DNA, according to court documents.

Georgia uses the sedative pentobarbital to execute people, according to the Department of Corrections.