with the St. Louis prosecutor's support, Circuit Judge David C. Mason...

with the St. Louis prosecutor's support, Circuit Judge David C. Mason signed an order reducing Charles W. Armentrout’s death sentence to life without parole.
Charles W. Armentrout III had faced execution for killing his 81-year-old grandmother on March 18, 1995, because she refused to give him money for drugs. Despite repeated warnings from 2 St. Louis Circuit Court judges, Armentrout, now 41, insisted upon representing himself during his trial downtown in February 1998.
The court provided him with 2 public defenders as "stand-by counsel," but Armentrout handled both the trial and penalty hearing before Circuit Judge David C. Mason. Armentrout told the jury he had "planned to rob his grandmother, Inez Notter - but claimed that another man killed her.
In the year 2001 lawyers for Armentrout filed an appeal alleging that he had been "denied effective assistance at counsel, due process, equal protection, a fair trial, a fair penalty phase, and was subjected to cruel and unusual punishment."
St. Louis Circuit Attorney Jennifer Joyce had agreed to the reduction in sentence in return for Armentrout's promise to permanently drop all appeals.