Montgomery County DA Going For Death Penalty in 2014 Double Murder

CONROE, TX — For the first time since 2009, the Montgomery County District Attorney's Office is pursuing the death penalty against someone.

The DA's office wants to give Russell Lee Ketchum the hot shot for allegedly killing Louis Wilkerson, 58, and Lisa McWashington, 43.

In Oct. 2014, Ketchum, 41, allegedly choked Wilkerson to death with his bare hands. He's accused of using a shirt to strangle McWashington. Both bodies were dumped in the 800 block of West Santa Fe, near downtown Conroe.

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Ketchum was arrested in January 2015 and has remained in custody at the Montgomery County Jail without bond. Ketchum's attorney plans to claim that the killings were self-defense.

Although this the first death penalty case since 2009, it isn't the first capital murder case. The DA's office has tried multiple capital murder cases, the prosecutors didn't think that the circumstances of those cases rose to the level of the death penalty.