Lisa Montgomery executed after SC gave OK

In the United States, a female federal prisoner has been executed for the first time since 1953. That happened shortly after the Supreme Court gave the go-ahead.

Lisa Montgomery (52) was convicted for the murder of Bobbie Jo Stinnett (23) in December 2004 in Missouri. Stinnett was pregnant, and Montgomery cut open her belly after the murder to remove her unborn child. That survived, and Montgomery pretended it was her child.

Montgomery was scheduled to be executed yesterday, but a judge put a stop to that. A few hours before Montgomery’s scheduled execution, that judge ruled that a new psychiatric examination was necessary, and a higher judge then came to the same conclusion. But the Supreme Court swept these judgments off the table, after which the death sentence was carried out.

Lawyers had strongly opposed the execution. They argued that she is mentally ill and is suffering from serious mental health problems after a childhood full of abuse. The woman was reported to have been repeatedly raped as a child by her stepfather and his friends. According to Attorney Kelley Henry, execution is “brutal, unlawful and abuse of power by the authorities.” Henry also denounced the speed with which the sentence was carried out.