Michael Joe Boyd

Case record

Michael Joe Boyd was convicted of felony murder stemming from the shooting death of William Price during an armed robbery in November 1986.

The offence

Price and a companion, David Hippen, solicited two women, Barbara Lee and Renita Tate, to accompany them to a Memphis motel. When they arrived at the Lorraine Motel, Price gave one of the women a $100 bill to rent two rooms.

Michael Boyd, who was Lee’s boyfriend, drove up to the scene with two other men and approached Price’s van. Boyd pointed his pistol at Hippen and demanded money. Price grabbed Boyd’s arm, and Boyd fired the gun. A struggle ensued. When Price tried to drive away from the scene, Boyd “emptied” the gun at him, striking him with five or six shots, which caused his death.

Investigation

Trial

Boyd had been convicted of second-degree murder in 1983 and had served 3 years of a ten-year sentence before being paroled only 4 months before killing William Price. Boyd was later convicted of felony murder related to Price’s shooting death during the armed robbery.

Sentencing

Boyd was sentenced to death in 1988.

Appeals

Outcome

On September 4, 2007, Governor Phil Bredesen commuted the death sentence of Michael Joe Boyd to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. Gov. Bredesen said:

“This appears to me an extraordinary death penalty case where the grossly inadequate legal representation received by the defendant at his post-conviction hearing, combined with procedural limitations, has prevented the judical system from ever comprehensively reviewing his legitimate claims of having received ineffective assistance of counsel at the sentencing phase of his trial. This combination of inadequate representation and procedural limitations within the judicial system raises in my mind a substantial and unresolved doubt that the trial jury would have imposed the death penalty had the defendant received competent legal representation.”

Other details

The case involved four named participants in the sequence of events: William Price and David Hippen (as companions who solicited the women), and Barbara Lee and Renita Tate (the women solicited to accompany them to the motel).