Execution on hold

TERRE HAUTE — The US government’s plans to carry out its first execution of a female inmate in nearly seven decades were on hold on Tuesday amid a flurry of legal rulings, and two other executions set for later this week were halted because the inmates tested positive for COVID-19.

The three executions were to be the last before President-elect Joe Biden, an opponent of the federal death penalty, is sworn-in next week.

Now it’s unclear how many additional executions there will be under President Donald Trump, who resumed federal executions in July after 17-year pause.

Ten federal inmates have since been put to death.

Lisa Montgomery faced execution on Tuesday for killing 23-year-old Bobbie Jo Stinnett in the northwest Missouri town of Skidmore in 2004.

She used a rope to strangle Stinnett, who was eight months pregnant, and then cut the baby girl from the womb with a kitchen knife.

Montgomery took the child with her and attempted to pass the girl off as her own.

But an appeals court granted a stay of execution on Tuesday, shortly after another appeals court lifted an Indiana judge’s ruling that found she was likely mentally ill and couldn’t comprehend she would be put to death.

If a higher court puts the execution back on, Montgomery, the only female on federal death row, would receive a lethal injection at a federal prison complex in Terre Haute, Indiana.

The government has acknowledged Montgomery’s mental issues but disputes that she can’t comprehend that she is scheduled for execution for killing another person because of them.