DEATH ROW LAWYERS CONTRACT VIRUS, FORCING DELAY

The two lead lawyers for Lisa Montgomery, pictured, the only woman on death row in the United States, asked a judge on Thursday to delay Montgomery’s execution next month because they contracted COVID-19 after travelling to meet with her to prepare her petition. The lawyers, Kelley Henry and Amy Harwell, are both too sick to meet the deadline set for this Sunday to file Montgomery’s clemency petition, and the Department of Justice has denied their request for an extension, according to the complaint filed in the U.S. District Court in Washington. The complaint says Attorney General William Barr was reckless to schedule executions during a pandemic. Montgomery was convicted in 2007 in Missouri for kidnapping and strangling Bobbie Jo Stinnett, who was eight months pregnant when she was killed. The child survived.