I know many important things are happening in the world right now. It's hard to make room for particularized atrocities, especially those that involve people who have committed terrible crimes. Please spend a minute with me on a grave injustice that's unfolding in our system.
In 2011, Lisa Marie Montgomery was convicted of killing a woman in order to kidnap her unborn baby. Although the crime itself indicates mental illness, prosecutors sought and secured the death penalty under federal law.
Her life has been one failure of people and systems after another. She was raped, tortured, physically and emotionally abused as a child by her mother, by her mother's partners, by plumbers and electricians (her father offered his daughter's body as payment to men), by partners.
At a divorce trial, her abusive mother testified that she had seen her partner raping Ms. Montgomery. No action was taken. Lisa told adults in her life. No one protected her. By adulthood, she had moved more than 60 times and frequently lived in places without running water.
I cannot adequately describe the severity of the trauma she endured and the resulting damage done to her mental health. She committed a terrible crime. She was defended by a lawyer with no death penalty experience. Her trial was marred by misogyny.
Prosecutors referred to her defense as the "abuse excuse." The jury was told that Ms. Montgomery was a bad mother who never cooked and cleaned. The severity of her trauma and illness was not properly presented. And, as happens bc the bar is so high, she lost her appeals.
This October, the Department of Justice announced its intent to execute Ms. Montgomery on December 8. In the middle of a global pandemic, with the imminent possibility of an administration change, the DOJ prioritized the speedy execution of a mentally ill prisoner.
When her lawyers visited her in prison, they found that she had been placed on suicide watch, stripped of her personal possessions, her underwear, her privacy, her eyeglasses, and her CPAP machine. She is given 3 cold showers a week. She appears to be dissociative.
During their visits to prepare her clemency petition, Ms. Montgomery's lawyers contracted Covid-19. They are now bedridden. Additionally, the expert observation required to present her clemency petition has been made nearly impossible by Covid-19.
If Ms. Montgomery is executed, she will be the first woman killed by the federal government for crimes in almost 70 years. She will have been denied the right to present her clemency argument because of the pandemic. She will be killed by a lame duck administration.
No one will be made safer by the execution of a severely traumatized person who has expressed remorse for her crime and requires psychiatric medication and treatment. The victims of her crimes will not be restored in any way by her death.
This is a morally bankrupt outcome. I'm so grateful for the work of Sister @helenprejean, @sandralbabcock, and the many people and organizations working against the unjust, cruel death penalty. I sincerely hope that justice will prevail.
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