State’s highest court will not rehear death row appeal

Published 6:30 am Friday, May 10, 2019

The Mississippi Supreme Court says it won’t reconsider appeals from a death row inmate convicted of capital murder after a woman he was living with was stabbed to death and her home was burned.

Timothy Ronk was sentenced to death in 2010 in Harrison County for the August 2008 killing of Michelle Craite. Prosecutors said Ronk stabbed Craite and burned her house in the Woolmarket community, near Biloxi, to cover up the crime.

The high court on Thursday said it won’t reconsider its earlier rejection of appeals from Ronk. Among other things, he argued he had ineffective legal representation.

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Prosecutors say Ronk took items from Craite and gave them to a Florida woman he met online. Defense attorneys argued the stabbing was self-defense.

Ronk does not have an execution date.