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US Set To Execute First Woman In 67 Years Before Trump Leaves Office

US Set To Execute First Woman In 67 Years Before Trump Leaves Office

Lisa Montgomery killed an expectant mother before cutting the unborn child from her womb

Rebecca Shepherd

Rebecca Shepherd

A woman who murdered an expectant mother before cutting the unborn child from her womb is set to be executed days before Donald Trump leaves the presidential office.

Lisa Montgomery will become the first woman in 67 years to be put to death in the US, and is currently the only woman on federal death row.

Police during the investigation.
PA

Montgomery was 36 when she killed Bobbie Jo Stinnett in 2004 in the state of Missouri.

On an internet chatroom, posing as a fellow pregnant woman, Montgomery befriended the mother-to-be. Under the pretext of wanting to buy a dog, she arranged to meet at Ms Stinnett's home.

There she proceeded to strangle her unsuspecting victim from behind before cutting her open and stealing her unborn child while she was still alive. Stinnett died later.

Montgomery then took the child to Kansas where she was later arrested. The baby was removed from her possession and later united with the father.

Wyandotte County Sheriff's Department

Montgomery's execution date was recently delayed because two of her lawyers contracted coronavirus. The delay was put in place for her attorneys to recover, but also to give them chance to file a petition on her behalf in a bid to save her life.

As it stands, she is due to be executed on 12 January - eight days before anti-capital punishment politician Joe Biden is sworn into office.

Sandra Babcock, who has previously entered declarations to the court on the case, told The Tennessean of the USA TODAY Network that the delay gives time to prepare and present a clemency application.

She said: "Mrs. Montgomery's case presents compelling grounds for clemency, including her history as a victim of gang rape, incest and child sex trafficking, as well as her severe mental illness.

"She will now have the opportunity to present this evidence to the President with a request that he commute her sentence to life imprisonment."

Babcock continued: "It is difficult to grasp the extremity of the horrors Lisa suffered from her earliest childhood. No one intervened to help Lisa, though many knew what was happening to her."

According to reports from the US Bureau of Prisons records, the last woman executed by the US government was Bonnie Brown Heady on 18 December 1953.

Heady and her boyfriend had kidnapped the six-year-old son of a wealthy Kansas City couple and killed the boy before collecting the ransom.

Featured Image Credit: Wyandotte County Sheriff’s Department

Topics: News, US News, crime