Family of murdered Missouri couple looks to inmate's execution for 'satisfaction'
In 2009, Angela and Rodney Gilpin were working on repairing their relationship. The Missouri couple's marriage had been rocked by a separation and a love affair with a neighbor, but they had two kids and they were determined to make it work.
Instead, the Gilpins were shot to death, their bodies left in the threshold of their apartment in Jefferson City in 2009.
Angela Gilpin's former lover, David Hosier, was later arrested, charged and convicted of murder in her death after prosecutors painted him as an angry, jealous ex who decided that if Gilpin wasn't going to live with him, she couldn't live without him.
Hosier, who has always maintained his innocence, is set to be put to death by lethal injection in Missouri on Tuesday, a moment that Angela Gilpin's mother said at his sentencing would provide some "satisfaction."
USA TODAY is looking back at the Gilpins' lives and deaths as the execution fast approaches to remember who they were and what their loved ones lost.
The relationship between Angela Gilpin and David Hosier
The Gilpins had been married for 21 years, according to the Jefferson City News Tribune.
At some point during their separation in 2008 or 2009, Angela Gilpin began seeing Hosier, a neighbor at her apartment complex. It's unclear how long it lasted but Gilpin decided she was going to stay with her husband and ended things with Hosier, who was overheard saying that if Gilpin “would not come back with him” then he “would put a stop to it somehow," according to court records.
Two weeks before she was killed, Gilpin applied for a restraining order against Hosier and was looking to move apartments, writing to her landlord that she could no longer live next to Hosier, saying: "He scares me. I don't know he will do next."
The day before the killings, Hosier left a voicemail for a friend saying that he was going to "finish it" and called another one to say that he was going to "eliminate his problems," court records show.
Gilpins found murdered in apartment building
During the early morning of Sept. 28, 2009, a neighbor of the Gilpins found the couple dead of multiple gunshot wounds in the apartment doorway and no signs of forced entry.
Inside Angela Gilpin's purse was an application for a protective order, which said that Hosier was stalking and harassing her every day. Later that day following a pursuit, police arrested Hosier, who told officers: "Shoot me and get it over with," according to court documents.
Inside his car police found 15 firearms, including a STEN submachine gun, ammunition and a handwritten note that read: "If you are going with someone, do not lie to them, do not play games with them, do not (expletive) them over by telling other people things that are not true."
"Be honest with them and tell them if there is something wrong," the note continued. "If you do not, this could happen to you."
Hosier was later convicted of Angela Gilpin's murder, while the charge stemming from Rodney Gilpin's killing was dismissed, though it's unclear why.
Hosier, now 69, has said for years that he's innocent and recently reiterated that in an interview with the Kansas City Star.
“The fact that they were killed, nobody deserves anything like that,” Hosier told the newspaper. But "you cannot show remorse for something you did not do."
Angela Gilpin's family talks about robbed time, tragedy
The Gilpins' two sons, Dakota and Joshua Gilpin, testified at Hosier's sentencing hearing that "they wish every day they had more time with their mother."
Dakota Gilpin wrote a victim impact statement, saying that his mom was killed before she had finished teaching him how to cook. He had to learn how to drive a manual car from his brother, instead of his parents.
"Angie had a lot of life to be with her family and it was taken away," Robert Eichholtz, Angela's brother, said at the sentencing, according to KOMU-TV. "I will never understand."
Barbara Eichholtz, Angela's mother, also spoke.
"I buried my daughter because of this man's deed. No parent should ever have to do that," she said, according to the station. "I realize at 75 I'll never live to see him put to death. But I'll still have the satisfaction of knowing that will happen."
Republican Missouri Gov. Michael Parson denied Hosier's petition for clemency Monday.
"Ms. Angela Gilpin had her life stolen by David Hosier because he could not accept it when she ended their romantic involvement. He displays no remorse for his senseless violence," Parson said in a statement announcing the decision. "I cannot imagine the pain experienced by Angela’s and Rodney’s loved ones but hope that carrying out Hosier’s sentence according to the Court’s order brings closure."