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LIFE ON THE LINE
‘Womb raider’ Lisa Montgomery’s execution BLOCKED hours before her lethal injection in dramatic 11th hour court ruling
A JUDGE has blocked the execution of "womb raider" killer Lisa Montgomery just hours before she was due to become the first woman put to death by the federal government in almost 70 years.
Montgomery, 52, was convicted of strangling a pregnant woman to death, cutting out her baby and then kidnapping the child in Missouri in 2004 in a sickening crime which shocked America.
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She was expected to be given a lethal injection later today but a federal judge in Indiana late last night blocked the execution on mental health grounds.
The decision was based on evidence that she was unable to understand the government’s rationale for her execution.
Judge James Patrick Hanlon granted the stay of execution to allow the court to conduct a hearing to determine whether she is competent to be executed.
Montgomery’s lawyer, Kelley Henry, welcomed the ruling and said the court was right to put a stop to her execution.
“Mrs Montgomery is mentally deteriorating and we are seeking an opportunity to prove her incompetence,” Henry said in a statement.
The killer's lawyers have already asked for Donald Trump’s clemency, saying she committed her crime after a lifetime of being abused and raped.
In a nearly 7,000-page clemency petition filed last week, they asked the president to commute Montgomery’s sentence to life in prison.
Monday night's court decision was later upheld by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia circuit, pushing any new execution date into Joe Biden’s administration unless the Supreme Court now intervenes.
Biden opposes the death penalty and his spokesman, TJ Ducklo, has said he would work to end its use.
However, Trump has been a staunch supporter of capital punishment. The federal government under his administration executed 10 people in 2020 alone, more than all the states combined.
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Only five states carried out executions in 2020, and only one - Texas - carried out more than one.
The federal government is set to carry out two more executions - Cory Johnson and Dustin Higgs - before Trump leaves office on January 20.
Montgomery would be only the fifth woman put to death by the US government in history if her execution eventually moves forward.
The last woman to be executed by the government was Bonnie Heady, who died in a gas chamber in Missouri in 1953.
Montgomery was convicted of murder in the horrific 2004 attack of 23-year-old dog breeder Bobbie Jo Stinnett.
She reportedly pretended to be a pregnant woman named "Darlene Fischer" to bond with Stinnett, and went to her home pretending she wanted to buy a dog.
"Once inside the residence, Montgomery attacked and strangled Stinnett - who was eight months pregnant - until the victim lost consciousness," the Department of Justice said.
She then began cutting into the victim's abdomen, the DOJ said. When Stinnett regained consciousness, Montgomery strangled her to death before removing the baby.
The child miraculously survived and Montgomery tried to pass the baby off as her own, even .
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When Montgomery was taken in, the baby was given back to her father. She's now 16 years old.
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Montgomery's legal team has insisted that she was not represented properly in her previous trials, .
They argue that while there is no question of her guilt, her severe mental health issues and extreme sexual abuse she was subject to as a child was not taken into account.
Pleas for 'Womb raider' Lisa Montgomery's life as lawyers say she's 'brain damaged, ill and was sexually tortured'
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