U.S. federal authorities executed a female inmate early Wednesday, the first time since 1953. The female inmate was killed by an injection after the U.S. Federal Supreme Court on Tuesday reversed a lower court order staying her execution.
“Lisa Montgomery, 52, was executed at the federal prison in Terre-Haute, Indiana,” the U.S. Department of Justice announced in a statement. She was injected with a lethal injection and pronounced dead at 01:31 (06:31 GMT) on Wednesday.
Earlier, three “progressive” judges disagreed with Montgomery’s execution, but the Supreme Court rejected their final appeal and gave the green light for the execution.
According to AFP, in 2004, Lisa Montgomery, who was unable to have any more children of her own, killed a woman eight months pregnant in order to steal a fetus.
She found out online that the woman victim was a dog breeder and went to the pregnant woman’s home in Missouri under the guise of selling a terrier dog. There, she strangled the pregnant woman, opened her uterus and removed the fetus, leaving the victim in a pool of blood. The baby survived.
Montgomery’s attorneys do not deny the seriousness of her crime, but point out that she suffers from a severe mental disorder, saying it is a consequence of the violence and gang rape she suffered as a child. Lisa Montgomery was sentenced to death in Missouri in 2007.
On Monday night, a federal judge ordered a stay of her execution, allowing time to assess Montgomery’s mental state. That was before Judge Patrick Hanlon noted that “Ms. Montgomery is so far removed from reality that she cannot understand the government’s motivation for executing her.”
On Tuesday, an appeals court vacated the execution. But the Supreme Court granted the Justice Department’s request to carry out the death penalty. Two other judges asked for a stay of execution, which was also denied by the Supreme Court.
Montgomery became the first woman to be executed by U.S. federal authorities since 1953. Her execution, which had been postponed twice, was this time reversed by the federal Supreme Court, which had stayed the lower court’s order to stay the execution.
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