December execution date set for man convicted of killing a young Missouri girl

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — The Missouri Supreme Court has set a December execution date for Christopher Collings, an inmate convicted of raping and killing a 9-year-old girl nearly two decades ago. Collings is scheduled to receive a lethal injection at 6 p.m. on Dec. 3 at the state prison in Bonne Terre, Missouri. He was convicted in the 2007 death of Rowan Ford, a fourth-grader who went missing from her home in Stella, Missouri, on Nov. 3, 2007. Her body was found in a cave six days later. Police say the child had been strangled.