Serial killer William Clyde Gibson sentenced to death for Kirk murder

NEW ALBANY, IN (WAVE) - A New Albany man has been sentenced to die for the 2012 murder of a Clark County woman.

For the second time, Floyd Superior Court Judge Susan Orth handed down a death sentence to William Clyde Gibson, 56, of New Albany. This time it was for the murder of Stephanie Kirk, 35, of Charlestown, IN. The previous sentence came in October 2013 was for the murder of Christine Whitis, 75, the best friend of his late mother. He was arrested in April 2012 shortly after killing Whitis.

"I'm glad he was sentenced to death because that's what he needed," said Tony Kirk, Stephanie's father.

Kirk said he has been waiting two years to hear the words come of the the judge's mouth.

"In our society the acts of this defendant were the worst of the worst," said Floyd County Prosecutor Keith Henderson, "and it deserved our ultimate penalty."

[PREVIOUS STORY: Photo of serial killer's inaccurate 'death row' tattoo made public]

Gibson met Stephanie Kirk at a New Albany bar. He admitted to strangling her to death, and sexually assaulting her corpse, before burying her in the backyard of his Woodbourne Avenue home.

In handing down the sentence, Orth said Gibson showed no remorse.

"It seemed to me that he was very unmoved almost disinterested in this," Henderson said.

Any death sentence handed down in the Hoosier state is automatically appealed to the Indiana Supreme Court. That is not worrying Tony Kirk.

"If he died in prison before he's executed, so be it," said Kirk. "I'm 63, will be 64, I may go before he does. But at least when I do I know that he will be locked up he can't do anything to anybody else."

Gibson was taken back to the Indiana State Prison in Michigan City where he will wait on death row.

"Let's hope that the Indiana Department of Corrections on Death Row where we're holding the worst of the worst, 13 now of these individuals, that there's appropriate supervision where they can't get get a tattoo on their head, let's hope."

The date for Gibson's execution would be in August 2015.

After making a plea deal in the 2002 murder of 45-year-old Karen Hodella of Jeffersonville, he received a 65-year sentence in that case.

Copyright 2014 WAVE 3 News. All rights reserved.