In March of 1996, a simple act of kindness outside a Milledgeville, Georgia Walmart set in motion a tragic and fatal series of events for Donovan Corey Parks. The 24-year-old male corrections officer was leaving the store after buying cat food when he was approached by two men, Robert Earl Butts Jr. and Marion Wilson Jr. Butts, who had previously worked with Parks, asked for a ride, and Parks, known for his caring nature, agreed.
Butts sat in the front passenger seat, and Wilson got into the back. This decision would be his last.
Shortly after leaving the Walmart parking lot, Parks was ordered at gunpoint to drive to a nearby residential street. There, he was forced out of his car and shot once in the back of the head with a sawed-off shotgun. His body was left face down in the street as his assailants fled in his vehicle. The motive for this brutal act, according to prosecutors, was for Butts and Wilson, both members of the Folk Nation street gang, to gain a higher status within their organization.
The investigation moved swiftly. Butts and Wilson were arrested just four days after the murder. During questioning, each man pointed the finger at the other as the one who pulled the trigger. Investigators found a sawed-off shotgun at Wilson's residence. The stolen car was later found abandoned and set on fire.
Both Robert Earl Butts Jr. and Marion Wilson Jr. were tried and convicted of murder. In separate trials, both men were sentenced to death for their roles in the killing of Donovan Corey Parks. After years of appeals, the sentences were carried out. Robert Earl Butts Jr. was executed by lethal injection on May 4, 2018. Marion Wilson Jr. followed, and was executed by lethal injection on June 20, 2019. Wilson's execution marked the 1,500th carried out in the United States since the resumption of capital punishment in 1976.
