Lisa Montgomery: US judge grants another stay of execution

[muriel_volestrangler]

Source: The Guardian/AP

A judge has granted another stay in what was slated to be the US government’s first execution of a female inmate in nearly seven decades.

Judge Patrick Hanlon granted the stay late on Monday, citing the need to determine Lisa Montgomery’s mental competence, the Topeka Capital-Journal reported.

Montgomery faced execution on Tuesday at the federal correctional complex in Terre Haute, Indiana, eight days before the president-elect, Joe Biden, an opponent of the federal death penalty, takes office.
...
Montgomery’s lawyers have argued that sexual abuse during her childhood led to mental illness. Attorney Kelley Henry spoke in favour of Monday’s decision, saying in a statement to the Capital-Journal that “Mrs Montgomery has brain damage and severe mental illness that was exacerbated by the lifetime of sexual torture she suffered at the hands of caretakers”.

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/12/lisa-montgomery-us-judge-grants-another-stay-of-execution

[Princess Turandot]

1. They also had appealed a different matter to the DC Court of Appeals for an en banc hearing..

... which is when the entire bench takes up the case. This appeal related to the execution method: they had lost on the last round. The judges agreed to hear the appeal by a vote of 5-4, because there have been recent decisions by their circuit court judges that conflicted with one another.

The filing dates for the various briefs and responses are currently between 1/19 and 1/29. At some point after that, a hearing will be scheduled.

The very short court order is linked in the tweet:

Link to tweet

This woman's crime was so horrific that it's hard to imagine a sane person doing it, although I suppose that you could say that about a lot of crimes.

[marble falls]

2. Good news. Delay until Joe Biden can at least cummute her sentence to life.