You might have seen the news recently that the US state of Tennessee is set to execute the first woman for nearly 200 years, convicted murderer Christa Pike.
This is the story of the last woman to be executed in the United States - Lisa Montgomery.
Lisa Montgomery committed an absolutely brutal murder
Montgomery was sentenced to death in 2007, and that sentence was carried out via lethal injection at a prison in Terre Haute, Indiana, in January 2021.
Her case is a harrowing one, a seriously brutal one, and one that leaves many questions about the death penalty due to Montgomery’s team claiming she was mentally ill.
The 52-year-old was found guilty of strangling a pregnant woman then cutting the baby out of her and kidnapping it.
The terrible incident occurred in Missouri in 2004, when victim Bobbie Jo Stinnett was just 23-years-old.
Stinnett bled to death as a result of the injuries Montgomery gave her, but remarkably the baby survived and was returned to her family later.
When she was killed, Montgomery became the first woman to be federally executed in 67 years.
Since then other women had been killed, but by the state rather than the federal government.
During the process of carrying out the sentence, Montgomery was reportedly asked if she had any last words and replied simply ‘no’.
Questions over of Montgomery’s sentence were raised
While her actions were no doubt shocking and wrong, Montgomery’s lawyer argued that she was a ‘damaged and delusional woman’ and said that the sentence was ‘far from justice’.
Kelley Henry, who had represented Montgomery, argued that everyone who took part in the execution ‘should feel shame’.
"The government stopped at nothing in its zeal to kill this damaged and delusional woman," she said.
"Lisa Montgomery's execution was far from justice."
Her argument was based around the fact that her client had claimed to be mentally ill and traumatized from abuse as a child.
It’s true that she was sexually and physically assaulted to a shocking extent by her father as a child - treatment that was tantamount to torture, her lawyers argued.
They further argued that at the time of the crime she was in a period of psychosis and detachment from reality.
However, the victim’s family argued that she deserved to be executed regardless because of the horrific and violent nature of her crimes.
She lured Stinnett in after the pair realized a shared love for dogs online.
When visiting her house, she overpowered the young woman and strangled her before cutting her baby out of her.
When police found Montgomery, she was cradling the baby claiming it as her own.
Eventually she confessed to the murder and was sentenced to death.