Alabama's longest-serving death row inmate dies from pneumonia at 61 after 41 years behind bars for murdering a couple and stabbing their children in 1978

Alabama's longest-serving death row inmate who served more than 41 years behind bars has died from pneumonia at the age of 61.

Arthur Lee Giles, of Atmore, died on September 30. 

He was one of two men convicted in the grisly 1978 murders of Carl and Willene Nelson on November 10, 1978 in their Blount County home in the farming area of northeast Birmingham.

Giles was 19 and worked for the Nelsons picking fruit and vegetables at the time of the murders.

Alabama double murderer Arthur Lee Giles died of pneumonia on September 30 at the age of 61 after serving more than 41 years on death row. He was the longest serving inmate on death row at the time of his passing, according to his obituary

After a night of drinking Giles and accomplice Aaron Jones, who was convicted and executed on May 3, 2007, went to the Nelson’s home with the intention of robbing them around 3am. 

The pair killed the Nelson couple and also shot and stabbed their three children, then aged 10, 13, and 21, and Carl Nelson’s mother, 85, in the early morning attack. The children and their grandmother survived the attack.

In the horrific ambush the eldest Nelson child, Tony, said Giles turned on the light in the bedroom he shared with his 10-year-old brother Charlie.

After a night of drinking Giles and accomplice Aaron Jones , who was convicted and executed on May 3, 2007, went to the Nelson’s home with the intention of robbing them around 3am

Carl Nelson confronted Giles and told him to leave and minutes later Giles shot Tony twice at the house’s back door.

Jones and Giles then made their way through the home shooting and stabbing the family members inside.

Willene Nelson died from 29 stab wounds across her body. She also suffered one gunshot wound to the left shoulder, Dr. Joseph Embry of the Alabama Department of Forensic Science testified in court. 

Carl Nelson died from a combination of gunshot wounds and stab wounds and was shot once through the heart and in the left arm. He was stabbed a total of eight times, including a brutal stab wound in the neck that severed his spinal cord.  

Giles, who was born and raised in Birmingham, first went on death row in 1979.

An appeals court overturned his case but he was convicted again in 1982.

A sentencing hearing in 1991 saw him land back on death row where he spent the rest of his life.

In that trial, the jury did not vote unanimously, with 11 choosing death and one choosing life without parole.

At his latest appeal a judge said Giles wasn’t entitled to relief.

'Seldom is there a capital murder case where you have more direct evidence against an accused than what was presented at Giles’ trails,' Court of Criminal Appeals Judge Kelli Wise wrote, according to The Gadsden Times.

Giles had been suffering from brain and lung cancer since 2018 and was cared for at Holman Correctional Facility

'He fought his death sentence steadfastly, and remained every hopeful that he would obtain relief in the courts. At the time of his death, his case was pending before the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in the Atlanta,' his obituary says.

Giles had been suffering from brain and lung cancer since 2018 and was cared for at Holman Correctional Facility.

In the jail Giles helped teach a law class and had a reputation for caring for his fellow death row inmates. 

'Art humbly acknowledged mistakes in his past, which resulted heavily from the extremely adverse and impoverished conditions in which he was raised, and he sought to demonstrate to everyone around him - attorneys, prison guards, and other inmates on death row - that he was a very different man in prison from the teenager he had been before, and that he sought to spread love, hope, perseverance and faith to everyone he encountered,' the obituary read.