The only woman on death row in Georgia WILL be executed after a
parole board denied a last minute plea for clemency from
her children and the pope.
Love cheat Kelly
Gissendaner, 47, has been on death row since 1997 over the death of her
husband, Douglas Gissendaner, who was stabbed to death by her boyfriend,
Gregory Owen.
Despite pleas from her children, a former state Supreme
Court justice and even Pope Francis, Gissendaner was set to be executed at 7 p.m. on
Tuesday, which would have made her the first woman in 70 years to be executed
in the state, the Associated
Press reports.
Board members were not
swayed by the inmate's latest appeal for clemency, which emphasised Gissendaner's
model behavior in prison and remorse for plotting her husband's murder.
They also did not
appear moved by a letter sent by an archbishop on behalf of Pope Francis urging
them to commute the inmate's death sentence.
The pope, who concluded
a six-day US trip on Sunday, is an outspoken opponent of the death penalty.
Gissendaner's lawyers
told the board her death sentence is disproportionate to her crime because she
did not kill her husband and was not present when he was stabbed to death.
Former lover Owen, who
carried out the kidnapping and murder, received a life sentence.
She would be the 16th
woman executed in the United States since the Supreme Court reinstated the
death penalty in 1976.
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