ST. LOUIS — The Rev. Darryl Gray held Kevin Johnson’s shoulder at 7:29 p.m. on Nov. 29 when Missouri issued the final order for Johnson to die for his crimes.
The other witnesses watched through windows into the bare, white execution chamber.
Gray sat by Johnson’s side, praying.
It was the first time that someone on death row in Missouri had a spiritual adviser beside them in the chamber during a modern execution, advocates say. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in March that the condemned have a constitutional right to clerical prayer and the “laying of hands†during an execution.
Gray’s presence that night was the culmination of a relationship that started with a tentative meeting in prison but led to weekly sessions between the ºüÀêÊÓƵ preacher well-known for his activism and a man in his final days of life. And Johnson made it clear from the beginning: He wanted Gray in the chamber with him at his death.
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“I hoped having me physically there in that moment would have some impact on him,†Gray said in a three-hour interview with the Post-Dispatch days after Johnson’s death. “But I knew it would impact me.â€
So in Missouri that night — when the needle was ready — curtains closed over the glass windows, and Gray remained at Johnson’s side.
Johnson has long admitted he murdered a Kirkwood police sergeant on July 5, 2005.
A group of officers had been called to serve an arrest warrant for Johnson that morning at the family home in Kirkwood’s historically Black Meacham Park neighborhood.
When officers arrived, Johnson, then 19, asked his 12-year-old half-brother, Joseph “Bam Bam†Long, to bring car keys to a relative. The boy ran to a neighbor’s house, where he collapsed and died of a congenital heart condition. Johnson blamed the officers.
Later that evening, one of those officers, Sgt. William McEntee, 43, returned to Meacham Park. He had offered to take a fireworks complaint from another officer because he was closer to the area.
Nicknamed “Big Mac†for his 6-foot-5 frame, McEntee was a nearly 20-year police veteran. He was married with children ages 13, 10 and 7.
That night, the sergeant was talking to teens suspected of shooting off the fireworks, when Johnson walked up in a rage, yelling about his brother’s death. He opened fire, hitting a 13-year-old boy in the leg and McEntee multiple times. McEntee drove a short distance, crashed, and fell out of the car.
Johnson walked over and shot him again in the back of the head.
Gray makes a choice
Some 17 years later, Rev. Gray met Kevin Johnson for the first time.
A prison guard stood to the side as the tall and lean Gray shook hands with Johnson in the visitation room lined with vending machines at the Potosi Correctional Center.
Johnson was by then 37 with a mellow demeanor and glasses. He’d seen Gray, a 40-year pastor and a fixture at ºüÀêÊÓƵ area protests, speaking on TV at rallies, often in a clerical collar and fedora, for justice reform.
But at that first meeting, Gray wasn’t yet certain if he wanted this role. Missourians for Alternatives to the Death penalty referred him, but the reverend had reservations.
“I have biases like everyone else,†he said in the interview with the Post-Dispatch. “You hear death row and you think: This person killed somebody. They committed a murder. Who am I meeting?â€
Gray, a senior pastor at Greater Fairfax Missionary Baptist Church in north ºüÀêÊÓƵ, said he also didn’t want to engage with someone who wasn’t sincerely seeking spiritual help.
“I take ministry serious. I don’t do drive-bys and it’s not a drive-thru,†Gray said. “And I was being asked to walk with someone through the last steps of their life. This had to be real.â€
Gray agreed to meet on Sept. 19, 2022, 71 days left before Johnson’s execution date.
He learned Johnson was head of recreation programs at the prison and had, while incarcerated, written two books with the help of his friend and former elementary school principal, Pam Stanfield.
He was focused on writing journals to be turned into a third book after his death.
Gray turned the conversation: “Tell me where you are with the crime,†he said.
“I did it,†Johnson replied. “You know if I could take it back, I would. It was one of the worst days of my life.â€
Gray asked him why he wanted a spiritual adviser.
Johnson said he’d often had a fractured relationship with God, but wanted to make a connection while he still could.
“A fractured faith is better than no faith at all,†Gray told him.
Johnson had decided finally to “submit to the will of God,†he wrote in journal entries recounting that meeting with Gray, according to copies provided by Stanfield.
They agreed to meet for about 90 minutes once a week for a Bible study and discussion.
Johnson quickly gravitated to the reverend.
“Since I was a kid, I have always been fascinated with distinguished, positive black role models,†he wrote in the journals. “Seeing a black man in this light was so rare that I could count each previous experience on one hand.â€
Bible study on death row
Johnson wasn’t a passive listener to Gray’s instruction in the visitation room over the coming weeks: He told the reverend he wanted to closely study three sections of the Bible.
First, they read Genesis, the first book of the Bible. Johnson wanted to discuss it because it focuses on God’s relationship with humans.
Johnson told Gray he hadn’t often felt God in his life: He was placed in his aunt’s custody at age 4 after the state removed him and his siblings from his drug-addicted mother. His father, Kevin Johnson Sr., was in prison for murder. He bounced around group homes for most of his life.
He had a daughter, Khorry Ramey, as a teenager. He became her only parent when her mother, Dana Ramey, was shot and killed in Kirkwood by an ex-boyfriend in September 2010, about three years after Johnson was sentenced to die.
“I told him God can turn evil into good,†Gray said. “What good can you do now?â€
At Johnson’s request, Gray moved on to the Bible’s Book of Psalms, focusing on one of the most famous passages of the Bible: Psalm 23.
“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil,†it reads. “For thou art with me.â€
“Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life,†it continues, “and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.â€
Johnson’s legal appeals were ongoing then. Gray said he focused on the word mercy in the meetings.
“I always had more hope than he did,†Gray recalled. “I had to have hope, but he was always a realist. He’d say: I killed a cop in Missouri. I’m going to die.â€
The final books Johnson asked to study were The Gospels. He connected with the story of the penitent thief crucified on the cross beside Jesus. “Remember me,†the thief asks Jesus, “when you come into your kingdom.â€
Gray told Johnson that the thief died with his dignity, despite his crimes.
It became a refrain in their relationship they repeated each week: Keep your dignity.
About a month before Johnson’s execution, Gray got an unexpected call from prison chaplain Mark Wilkinson.
“I have good news,†the chaplain said. “Kevin wants to be baptized.â€
A baptism
Gray wore his white clerical robes when he returned to the prison Nov. 8.
Gray and a few prison staff members gathered around a large baptismal bath outside the chaplain’s office. Another prisoner was there to record video for the prison’s internal television station.
Johnson changed into prison-issued shorts and told Gray he was ready. He professed his faith and Gray lowered him underwater.
“When he came out of the water his face was all smiles,†Gray said. “That was the first time I cried. I baptized hundreds of people, but that felt like baptizing my own son.â€
Johnson wrote about the baptism in his journals.
“It was surreal as my head went under the water and when I came up,†he wrote, “I literally felt like a new man.â€
When Johnson had two weeks left to live, Gray’s visits changed.
The pastor was now required to meet Johnson from behind glass. Johnson wore shackles on his legs. He was accompanied by two guards instead of one.
Gray was conflicted about his role as a spiritual adviser.
“I was asking myself: Am I part of the props?†he said. “I’d rather be outside hollering and screaming, but is it my job to keep him calm so you can kill him?â€
Gray did get involved in the push for Johnson’s clemency.
Activists argued Johnson’s case should not have risen to the level of first-degree murder, which requires “cool deliberation†rather than a crime of passion.
A jury deadlocked in Johnson’s first trial over the question, with 10 jurors in favor of second-degree murder and two for first-degree, two jurors said at the time.
Jurors in a second trial in 2007 found Johnson guilty of first-degree murder. ºüÀêÊÓƵ County Prosecuting Attorney Bob McCulloch recommended the death penalty. The jury agreed.
McCulloch, who was 12 when his own father was killed in the line of duty as a ºüÀêÊÓƵ police officer, personally prosecuted Johnson’s case.
Johnson’s final appeals rested on arguments of racial discrimination. McCulloch’s office prosecuted five people for killing a police officer. He sought the death penalty against all four Black defendants, but not for the white defendant.
McCulloch has denied that bias played a role in his prosecutions.
On Nov. 22, Gov. Mike Parson said he would not consider clemency in Johnson’s case. “You got a guy that went over there and cold-blooded killed a police officer,†Parson told reporters.
“You know, sometimes you have to answer the consequences of that,†he said.
Two days later, Gray visited Johnson for Thanksgiving.
“I could see a heaviness was on him then,†he recalled. “We didn’t talk about anything serious, just talked about who he spoke to that day, his Thanksgiving meal. But his demeanor was different.â€
The night before Johnson was scheduled to die, the Missouri Supreme Court in a 5-2 ruling denied his appeal.
Kevin Johnson’s last day
Johnson spent his last morning writing.
Gray met him at 10 a.m. in his holding cell in the correctional center in Bonne Terre. The execution was scheduled for 6 p.m. that night.
Johnson told Gray he’d met with his daughter — one of his most important relationships in prison — and her infant son that morning. He described talking with friends.
“He didn’t seem scared,†Gray said. “He was in a zone and wanting to write.â€
Gray read Psalm 23. He administered Holy Communion to Johnson in the cell.
Johnson refused the prison’s last meal, eating only snacks.
At midday, Gray left the prison and met with Johnson’s family and activists. He reported back to the prison a little after 5 p.m.
“I think I was trying to find every reason not to go back,†Gray said. “I wasn’t ready.â€
Over the next hour and a half, Gray waited.
At 6:32 p.m. the Missouri Department of Corrections was told the U.S. Supreme Court issued its ruling, giving the final denial of all motions for a stay. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson and Justice Sonia Sotomayor dissented.
A guard then came to escort Gray to the execution room.
“It was like I was wearing lead shoes,†Gray said.
But his adrenaline was surging.
“I knew I had to hold it together because I’m going to sit down with Kevin,†he said.
He walked into the chamber. Kevin was already lying on the table.
“He just looks up and smiles,†Gray said, through tears.
“Hey, Rev.,†Johnson said.
“They got everybody talking about you, man,†Gray said. “They’re talking about you in Germany.â€
“I’m keeping my dignity, Rev.,†he said.
Curtains covering viewing room windows opened just after 7:20 p.m. Witnesses there included McCulloch, members of McEntee’s family, reporters and a few of Johnson’s family and friends.
Gray read scripture and prayed until 7:29 p.m., when prison officials got the final order for execution.
He rubbed Johnson’s shoulder as the curtains closed.
Johnson said to Gray he was sorry for what he’d done. He apologized to his daughter and the McEntee family. He said he was going to meet his brother. He said he was ready, Gray recalled.
The state administered a lethal dose of pentobarbital.
Gray said he could feel the poison go through Johnson’s body.
“It was like when you turn on a faucet and feel the water running through,†Gray said. “I can only hope God took him then.â€
Guards ushered Gray into another room. “I sat in the chair and I just cried,†he said.
The curtains opened again.
Johnson was pronounced dead at 7:40 p.m.
McEntee’s widow, Mary McEntee, told reporters her family had long waited for the death of the man who was her husband’s “judge, jury and executioner.â€
She said it devastated her children. “They didn’t have a chance to say goodbye,†she said. “It took 17 years of grieving and pushing forward to get to this point this day. This is something I hope no other family has to go through because you truly never forget or get over it.â€
Gray on Wednesday presided over Johnson’s funeral.
He titled his eulogy: “Finishing Strong.â€