Christopher Collings is scheduled to be executed for the murder of 9-year-old Rowan Ford

Please note that this story contains material about disturbing crimes committed against a young girl.

Christopher Leroy Collings, a father of two daughters who was convicted of raping and murdering a 9-year-old girl in 2007, is scheduled to be executed Tuesday in Missouri.

Collings, 49, is scheduled to die by lethal injection for the Nov. 3, 2007, murder of nine-year-old Rowan Ford in the tiny southwest Missouri village of Stella. If the execution moves forward, Collings will be the 23rd inmate executed in the U.S. this year and the fourth in Missouri.

Collings lost his last chances for a reprieve on Monday when the U.S. Supreme Court rejected a stay of execution and Republican Gov. Michael Parson denied him a pardon.

Collings’ lawyer told USA TODAY his client was remorseful and had been treated unfairly by the justice system, while Rowan Ford’s older sister said the lethal injection wasn’t a painful enough end for her.

Here’s what you need to know about Collings’ execution.

When and where will Christopher Colling’s execution take place?

Collings is scheduled to be executed at the Potosi Correctional Center in Bonne Terre, Missouri, at 6 p.m. He is allowed to ask for a final meal and is expected to give the last words.

What was Christopher Collings convicted of?

On the night of November 2, 2007, Collings was drinking heavily with two friends. One of the friends, David Spears, had a 9-year-old stepdaughter named Rowan Ford, whose mother worked her night shift at Walmart.

At some point that night, the men left Rowan home alone and began hanging out at Colling’s trailer. As the third friend drove Spears home on back roads to avoid being pulled over, Collings later told police that he ran to Spears’ house, kidnapped a sleeping Rowan, put her in his truck and took her to his trailer, according to court documents .

Once there, he raped her, police said. Afterwards he said he wanted to take her home.

“He led her outside facing away from him so she couldn’t see his face,” court documents state. “He made sure to turn off the lights and didn’t speak so she wouldn’t recognize his voice.” But he said Rowan turned around and because there was moonlight, he recognized who he was. Then he “went crazy,” he said.

“When he saw a spool of line in the bed of a pickup truck next to him, he grabbed the line, wrapped it around her neck and began pulling very hard,” court documents state. “She struggled a little and fell to the ground; He went down with her and held her until she stopped moving.”

Collings said he then dumped her body into a cave. She was found on November 9, about a week after her disappearance sparked an Amber Alert and an intensive search.

When the jury at his murder trial recommended the death penalty for Collings, it found the killing to be “egregious and wantonly heinous, horrific and inhumane.”

Who was Rowan Ford?

News of Rowan’s disappearance, which came to light when her mother returned home from work and couldn’t find the girl, was shocking to her small community in Stella, which is home to fewer than 200 people.

Everyone knew Rowan as a lively little girl who was always riding her purple bike, working hard in school, going to church so much that she sometimes went alone, and having her bedroom painted Barbie pink.

“I’m so proud of the girl she’s become,” Rowan’s older sister Ariane Macks told USA TODAY this week. “A part of me died when my sister died. I’ve lost my ray of sunshine.”

Rowan, the youngest of five siblings, was so shy that she sometimes hid behind her older sister, said Macks, who was 18 when her sister was killed.

“She was very shy, but when she opened up, it was like the whole room lit up,” Macks said. “Rowan, she was very special. There was no one who didn’t like her.”

The morning before Rowan’s funeral, teachers and students at Rowan’s school planted a pink dogwood tree in her honor and released purple balloons with notes from their classmates attached. A concrete angel was placed at the spot and a marker reading “11. April 1988” for the day of her birth and “9. November 2007” for the day her body was found.

Macks, now 35 and living in Lineville, Alabama, said Collings deserved to be executed for her sister’s murder, but that lethal injection wasn’t enough.

“I wanted him dead, I still do… but they could have done something better than a lethal injection because he gets off easy,” she said. “I can’t imagine the pain when (Rowan) was strangled. Because Chris was so tall and so big compared to my little sister, she had no chance of fighting.”

Who is Christopher Collings?

Collings was a problem child who never formed an emotional bond with anyone because he suffered severe neglect from his birth parents and suffered multiple traumas after being placed in foster care, including at least two rapes, his lawyers argued during his trial.

Collings and his five older siblings ended up in the system – and separated from each other – because their parents “were involved in a lot of crime, involved in a lot of drug abuse,” his then-attorney Charles Moreland told jurors, adding that “the evidence was too will show that seeds of redemption lie dormant within Christopher Collings.”

Collings eventually became a father to two daughters but struggled with alcohol and marijuana addictions, according to court records. Macks recalled Collings’ drinking problem and said he became a different person when drunk.

Collings’ trial lawyers emphasized to jurors that he never intended to kill Rowan and that he deserved a life sentence, not the death penalty.

His current attorney, Jeremy Weis, told USA TODAY that Collings “is certainly incredibly remorseful” and “remarkably positive about his prospects” as the day of his execution approaches.

In his arguments for sparing Collings’ life, Weis has raised questions about his client’s confession, saying it was not recorded and was turned over to then-Wheaton Police Chief Clinton Clark, who had been convicted four times of imprisoning without permission and was supposed to do so never accepted into the force. He also highlighted Spears’ own confession to the crime, saying it cast even more doubt that Collings’ alleged confession was true and pointing out the extreme discrepancy in the two men’s verdicts.

Who witnesses the execution?

Macks said that one of her and Rowan’s brothers and their mother would be among the execution witnesses, but that she would not be able to make the trip from Alabama.

Weis said he would also be among those who witnessed his client’s execution.

The news media witnesses include: The Associated Press, Missourinet (a national news radio outlet), the Kansas City Star and KFNS-FM.

Christopher Collings is scheduled to be executed for the murder of 9-year-old Rowan Ford

ByAmelia Journalton

By Amelia Journalton

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