09/22/2025
Walter Lee Donnell, a 30-year-old inmate from St. Louis, was serving time for armed robbery as part of a gang. After his arrest, he turned informant, testifying against his accomplices, which earned him enemies and the label of a “snitch.” With a reported “price on his head,” he was placed in protective custody on death row in the basement of B Hall—not because he was sentenced to death, but due to overcrowding and the need for isolation from the general population.
During the riot, a group of 150-500 inmates targeted the death row area to settle scores. They battered through three steel-barred doors and a wall using a sledgehammer, despite guard Clarence Dietzel throwing his keys out of reach. Once inside, they obtained cell keys and released some inmates while attacking others. Donnell’s cell was entered before 10:30 p.m., and he was brutally murdered: stabbed multiple times (including at least twice through the heart and wounds to the neck), beaten, and his skull partially crushed, likely with the same bloody sledgehammer found in his cell. His body was found battered beyond recognition. In the adjacent cell, fellow informant James Creighton survived by jamming his lock with a broom handle and fending off attackers with a club and iron bar, though he was wounded in the face. Some sources suggest Donnell may have been killed by mistake, with Creighton as the primary target.
