‘Craven bloodlust’ slammed after 11th death row execution

A Kansas woman has been executed for strangling an expectant mother and taking her baby, the first time in nearly seven decades the US government has put to death a female inmate.

Lisa Montgomery, 52, was pronounced dead after receiving a lethal injection at the federal prison complex in Terre Haute, Indiana.

She was the 11 th prisoner to receive a lethal injection there since July when Donald Trump, an ardent supporter of capital punishment, resumed federal executions after 17 years without one.

“The craven bloodlust of a failed administration was on full display tonight,” Montgomery’s lawyer Kelley Henry said in a statement.

“Everyone who participated in the execution of Lisa Montgomery should feel shame.

“The government stopped at nothing in its zeal to kill this damaged and delusional woman.

“Lisa Mont go mery’ s execution was far from justice.”

It came after hours of legal wrangling before the Supreme Court cleared the way for the execution.

Montgomery killed 23- year- old Bobbie Jo Stinnett in the Missouri town of Skidmore in 2004.

She used a rope to strangle Ms 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.

An appeal court granted Montgomery a stay of execution on Tuesday, shortly after another appeals court lifted an Indiana judge’s ruling that found she was probably mentally ill and could not comprehend she would be put to death. Both appeals were lifted, allowing the execution of the only woman on federal death row.

Lisa Montgomery was executed by lethal injection.