ATLANTA — Georgia’s highest court has declined to hear an appeal filed by a man scheduled to be put to death next week and also declined to halt his execution.
Ray Jefferson Cromartie is scheduled to die Wednesday. He was sentenced to die for the April 1994 slaying of convenience store clerk Richard Slysz in Thomasville, just north of the Florida border.
The state says Cromartie and another man entered a convenience store on April 10, 1994, and fatally shot Slysz before stealing two cases of beer.
Cromartie’s attorneys sought to appeal a lower court’s denial of their requests for DNA testing and for a new trial and to stop his execution while that played out. The state Supreme Court on Friday refused to intervene.
Cromartie still has other court challenges pending.
Kate Brumback, The Associated Press
