JEFFERSON CITY — Travis Canon was a teenager when he got hooked on drugs.

He was 19 when he committed his first serious crime. In 1997, Canon and two accomplices robbed a convenience store on U.S. Highway 71 near Maryville. He shot and killed store clerk Gracie Hixson in the process.

  • Kathryn Palmer is an education reporter for the Columbia Missourian and a graduate student at the MU School of Journalism. She can be reached at kathryn.palmer@mail.missouri.edu