Georgia's First Female Death Penalty Sentence in 70 Years Postponed Due to Weather
The state of Georgia is delaying an execution of a female prisoner due to weather expected in the area.
ABC News reports Kelly Renee Gissendaner was found guilty of killing her husband in February 1997. According to prosecutors, her boyfriend Gregory Owen helped plot the murder; he pleaded guilty to the murder and received a lifetime prison sentence. Gissendaner was sentenced to death by a jury in 1998.
Gissendaner tried to get the State Board of Pardons and Paroles to reconsider the execution through a clemency hearing Tuesday, but on Wednesday it was announced that her request was denied.
Gissendaner will be the first woman in Georgia to be executed in about 70 years, according to Reuters. The execution was originally scheduled for Wednesday, but will now be moved to Monday.
Police investigated Gissendaner's report of her husband Douglas not returning from dinner with friends Feb. 7, 1997. Two days later, his burned-out car was found. Then about a week later, his stabbed body was found about a mile from the car in a secluded wooded area.
Information from the state attorney general's office said that Kelly and Douglas had a rough relationship. They would often break up and get back together. The couple even divorced once before getting re-married.
Gissendaner urged her boyfriend Owen to kill Douglas, even though Owen recommended she just divorce him, prosecutors said. Owen listened to Kelly and forced Douglas to drive to a remote area. There he stabbed Douglas to death, according to prosecutors.
When investigators tried to find the killer of Douglas, they discovered Owen's affair with Kelly and tried to blame him. Owen denied involvement at first, but then confessed and told investigators about Kelly's involvement too.
Owen pleaded guilty to the murder of Douglas and also testified against Gissdendaner.
Gissendaner's lawyers petitioned for clemency on behalf of their client. They pointed to letters from prison employees, clergy, educators and fellow inmates. The letters said that Kelly had changed and become a positive role model who helped troubled inmates and assisted prison guards with maintaining order. Two of Gissendaner's children also asked the parole board to spare their mother's life.
A statement from Gissendaner was also in the clemency petition.
"There are no excuses for what I did. I am fully responsible for my role in my husband's murder," she said. "I had become so self-centered and bitter about my life and who I had become, that I lost all judgment."
The petition for clemency was denied and Gissendaner will be sentenced to death by lethal injection Monday.
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