A Missouri man has been executed for the 1991 murder of an 11-year-old St Louis girl.

Martin Link died by injection at the state prison in Bonne Terre. It was the first execution in Missouri since May 2009 and only the second since 2006.

Link's fate was sealed on Monday when Governor Jay Nixon denied clemency and yesterday the courts refused to halt the execution.

Elissa Self-Braun disappeared on January 11, 1991, while walking to her school bus stop. Her body was found four days later along the St Francis River, 217km south of St Louis.

DNA evidence connected Link to the crime.

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