The state of Georgia executes Willie Pye, an inmate sentenced to death for the 1993 murder of Alicia Lynn Yarbrough.

(CNN) — The state of Georgia on Wednesday executed death row inmate Willie Pye, who was convicted and sentenced to death for the 1993 murder of Alicia Lynn Yarbrough.

A Georgia prison was executed at 11:03 p.m. at a prison in Jackson, about 50 miles south of Atlanta, the first in Georgia in more than four years, according to a Department of Justice news release. Pai did not make a final statement, according to the statement.

Payne, 59, was executed after the US Supreme Court rejected his final appeal on Wednesday night. In an application for clemency and in several court briefs, Pai and his lawyers asked for his life to be spared, citing intellectual disability, a troubled upbringing and ineffective legal aid.

Pye is the first to be executed in Georgia since January 2020, according to the nonprofit Death Penalty Information Center. According to the American Bar Association, executions there stopped as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.

According to court records, Pyne was convicted in 1996 of premeditated murder, kidnapping with bodily injury, armed robbery, burglary and rape in the murder of Yarbrough, with whom he had an on-again, off-again relationship.

The execution was preceded by a flurry of last-minute appeals, not uncommon in capital cases, including the U.S. Includes two cases filed in the Supreme Court that were ultimately dismissed.

Willie James Pye, executed at the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison, poses for a Georgia Department of Corrections photograph on an unspecified date. (Credit: Georgia Department of Corrections/Reuters)

In one, Pye argued that he should not be executed because of a pandemic-era agreement between the Georgia attorney general’s office and capital defense attorneys that effectively halted executions in the state until certain conditions were met.

Paya’s lawyers argued that by excluding him from the deal, the state placed him in the “disadvantaged class of death row inmates,” allegedly violating the equal protection and due process clauses of the 14th Amendment. The state urged the justices to deny Pay’s appeal, citing the state court’s determination that it was not a party to the contract.

The second appeal stemmed from Pai’s contention that he had an intellectual disability, which his lawyers argued should make his execution unconstitutional. However, because Georgia requires inmates to prove an intellectual disability beyond a reasonable doubt, Paya’s lawyers said the burden of proof is so high that it should be unconstitutional.

Once again, the state urged the court to deny the appeal, in part, because of the state court’s prior rejection of similar claims.

In refusing to stay Pai’s execution, the Supreme Court did not explain its reasoning, as is often the case in emergency appeals. There were no differences noted.

Murder of Alicia Lynn Yarbrough

Pye, along with two accomplices, intended to rob the man where Yarbrough was staying, the appeals court decision said. Pye was angry with Yarbrough because the man had signed the birth certificate of a child claiming to be his. Pye bought a .22-caliber handgun before the three men donned ski masks and went to the man’s home, where Yarbrough was alone with the child.

Pye broke down the door and held Yarbrough at gunpoint, the court decision says. The men took a ring and necklace from Yarbrough, then kidnapped her and took her to a motel, where they raped her.

They then drove Yarbrough to a dirt road, where Pai ordered him out of the car, told him to lie face down and shot him three times, according to the court ruling. An accomplice of Pai later confessed and testified for the state, and DNA analysis of semen taken from the victim’s body matched Pai.

According to the Georgia Attorney General’s Office, Pine’s jury recommended the death penalty, which was ultimately awarded by the court to 20 years in addition to three life sentences.

Pye’s accomplices are serving life sentences for their roles in Yarbrough’s murder, Georgia corrections records show.

A Georgia Department of Corrections officer walks through the entrance to the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison in Jackson in 2011. (Credit: Eric S. Lesser/AFP/Getty Images)

Pai alleged that his trial lawyer ‘abandoned his position’.

Pye’s clemency petition argued for a commutation of the life sentence, citing ineffective legal assistance from his trial attorney, who died in 2000.

In fact, three of Willie Pye’s jurors opposed his execution, citing factors in the prisoner’s background that were not represented by his clemency plea that he had an overly burdensome and ineffective public defender. However, the state parole board wasn’t convinced: After meeting Tuesday and “carefully considering all the facts and circumstances of the case,” it denied the pardon, according to a news release.

At the time, that attorney was “responsible for all nonlife defense services” for Spalding County, Georgia, through a contract for which he received a lump sum, the petition says.

With the help of only one other attorney and an investigator, Paya’s attorney was responsible for hundreds of felony cases at a time, in addition to his private practice, the petition said. At the time he represented Pai, the attorney was also representing defendants in four other capital cases. As a result, the lawyer “effectively abandoned his position.”

Had he given Pye adequate representation, the jurors “would have found that Mr. Pye has an intellectual disability and an IQ of 68,” his petition said, below the 100 average. Birth: Deep poverty, neglect, constant violence and chaos in his family home, which shut down the possibility of healthy development,” the petition said.

The Georgia Supreme Court ruled in 1989 that the death penalty for people with intellectual disabilities violated the state’s constitution, a ruling that was upheld years later by the U.S. It was reiterated by the Supreme Court, which found in 2002 that such executions would violate state immunity. Cruel and unusual punishment.

Still, Georgia is the only state that sets the burden of proof at an “insurmountably high” standard beyond a reasonable doubt, Payne’s petition said.

His conviction and sentence were upheld on appeal to state and federal courts, although in 2021 a three-judge panel of the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the conviction, finding that Pai’s attorney’s work during the punishment phase of Pai’s trial was deficient. and harmful. However, that ruling was reversed a year later, after a hearing before the entire Eleventh Circuit.

Similarly, a state court previously reviewed Pai’s claim of intellectual disability but found in a 2012 ruling that Pai did not prove the necessary. This Wednesday, that court dismissed a similar appeal by Pye, finding that the suit was sequential, meaning it had already been decided, referring to the 2012 order.

— CNN’s John Fritz contributed to this report.