Editing Robert Lee Yates (section)

==Conviction==
On April 18 2000, Yates was arrested for the murder of sex worker Jennifer Joseph. A white van being tracked by the police was later found, and Yates's DNA was later found inside, along with blood from Jennifer Joseph. Yates's DNA was in turn linked to 12 other murdered sex workers. He pleaded guilty to 13 counts of murder and one count of attempted murder to avoid the death penalty and sentenced to 408 years in prison. He was later convicted for two other murders and sentenced to death in 2002.

Yates appealed his death sentence on the grounds that he believed his 2000 plea bargain to be all-encompassing, and that life in prison for 13 murders and capital punishment for two was an unreasonable application of the death penalty. His appeal was rejected in 2007, but he was granted a stay of execution in September 2008, and Washington State governor Jay Inslee refused to sign any death warrants in 2013, citing the high cost of the appeals process, the randomness of death sentences and a lack of evidence that the death penalty works as a deterrent. Yates's sentence was commuted to life imprisonment in 2018 after the Washington State Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty violated the state constitution.
[[Category:List]][[Category:Male]][[Category:Serial Killer]][[Category:Modern Villains]][[Category:Living Villains]][[Category:Imprisoned]][[Category:Misogynists]][[Category:Perverts]][[Category:Rapists]]
[[Category:Addicts]]