Kelly P. Kisssel has been working as a metro editor at The Advocate, located in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, since 2018. Mr. Kissel is from the Baton Rouge area and earned his bachelor's degree in journalism from LSU in 1984. Mr. Kissel moved back to Baton Rouge from Arkansas to work at The Advocate after he retired from his position as a news editor with the Associated Press (AP).
Kelly P. Kissel's 34-year career with AP began in 1984. Kissel worked in New Orleans, Jackson, Miss.; Charleston, W. Va.; Huntington, W. Va., and State College, Pa. He went to Little Rock in 1994 as news editor where he helped cover the Whitewater and Paula Jones stories during Bill Clinton’s presidency. As Kissel’s time with the AP was drawing to a close, he directed coverage of the Little Rock Central desegregation 60th anniversary. The coverage received a top internal AP prize for digital storytelling. The stories were the work of Little Rock’s AP bureau and the wire service’s race and ethnicity team.
From 2009 until 2017, Kissel was news editor of the AP’s bureaus in Little Rock and Oklahoma City. During the years that he worked with the AP, Mr. Kissel witnessed 10 executions, 9 in Arkansas and 1 in Oklahoma. The four most recently executed death row inmates in Arkansas were executed in April 2017, during an 11-day period. Kissel witnessed two of these condemned people who were executed during this "spree," including Kenneth Williams, the last of the four people to be executed. Kenneth Williams' execution was deemed botched by Kissel and other witnesses present.
The links below include both a sampling of the numerous articles that Kelly P. Kissel wrote and accounts of Kissel's testimony at a federal court hearing held to address challenges made to the lethal injection protocol in Arkansas.
On January 24th, I sat down with Mr. Kissel at his office at The Advocate in Baton Rouge to learn more about his experiences as a media witness at ten executions.
https://www.americamagazine.org/voices/kelly-p-kissel-associated-press
https://apnews.com/article/88dbdd478f504dfb92106478ab1b9e3c
https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2018/mar/23/arkansas-wants-court-lift-stay-execution-death-row/