Why Lisa Montgomery, the first woman in 68 years, was executed in the USA
In the USA, women are executed very reluctantly. Most often, criminals receive a life sentence instead of capital punishment. But Lisa Montgomery's crime turned out to be so monstrous that she was sentenced to lethal injection. The woman was executed in 2021 and she became the first suicide bomber in almost 7 decades. What did this American woman do and why did her lawyers insist on compulsory treatment?
Lisa Montgomery, nee Lisa Judy Shaughnessy, was born in 1968 in Melvern, Kansas, USA. Lisa's mother drank heavily and brutally beat the girl and her sister. New men constantly appeared in the house, one of whom raped Lisa's older sister Diana at the age of 8. The girl was taken from the family by the guardianship authorities, but for some reason Lisa was left. At the age of 13, another mother's lover raped her too.
After this incident, Lisa's mother forced her to engage in prostitution. From the age of 15, the girl, on the instructions of her mother, paid off her body with plumbers and electricians. To get out of this nightmare as quickly as possible, Lisa got married early, but with her husband Karl Boman she was no better off. He beat his wife and forced her to give birth to four children one by one. After that, the husband forced the woman to undergo sterilization.
Unable to withstand the bullying, Lisa divorced and soon married again, to Kevin Montgomery. But he was just as much a scoundrel as Carl. Humiliation, beatings and sex against the will were in the Montgomery house in the order of things. Such a life broke a woman, she started drinking heavily and stopped taking care of herself and the children. Later, the lawyers will insist that Lisa went insane because of constant bullying and lived in her own world of painful fantasies.
Bobbi Jo Stinnett lived in Skidmore, Missouri and her family was ordinary and quite prosperous. Her husband worked for Kawasaki Motors Manufacturing Co., and Bobbi herself was a housewife. She had a hobby — a woman bred rat terrier dogs and selling puppies was an additional income for the family. It was thanks to his hobby that the victim met the killer.
Lisa Montgomery and Bobby Joe started chatting on the Rat Terrier lovers forum. On it, users not only discussed pet care and breeding, but also chatted on a variety of topics. Everyone knew that Bobbi Jo was pregnant and her belly was clearly visible in the photos she posted online. Lisa wrote to Bobby that she too would soon become a mother and this brought the women closer together.
Before the tragedy, the victim and the killer met only once. It happened at a dog show in Kansas. Then Bobby and Lisa had a nice chat, discussing baby names and clothes for babies. No one could have imagined that a bloody denouement would soon take place. After all, even then a terrible plan matured in Montgomery's head, which she soon began to implement.
In the fall of 2004, Bobby Joe's friend and a major breeder of Rat Terriers, Jason Dawson, received an email. Its author called herself Darlene Fisher and said she wanted to buy a puppy in Missouri. The woman said that she plans to give a dog to her children for Christmas. Dawson immediately remembered that one of Bobby Joe's dogs had just recently had puppies. He didn't hesitate to give her contacts to Fisher. He also contacted Bobby and told him about a potential buyer.
Bobbi Jo was sure that a woman named Darlene Fisher was interested in dogs. How else, because this lady was recommended by her friend. The women chatted a little on the forum and soon Bobbie sent a letter to a new friend with an address and an invitation to come see the dogs. The customer was supposed to arrive in the afternoon, when there was no one at home except the hostess.
On the fateful day, December 16, 2004, Zeb Stinnett, Bobby Joe's husband, as always, left for work. He knew that his wife was waiting for a customer, but this was commonplace and did not cause him any concern. Before meeting with Fisher, Bobbie talked to her mother on the phone, casually telling her that she was expecting a guest. Their conversation was interrupted by a knock on the door—it must have been Darlene.
But when Bobbie opened the door, she saw Lisa Montgomery in front of her. She didn't have time not only to say anything, but even to be really surprised. The guest roughly pushed her into the house, entered and immediately threw a garrote around her neck. When the victim stopped resisting, Montgomery cut open her stomach with a kitchen knife, removed the child and wrapped him in a blanket. After that, no longer interested in the fate of her victim, Lisa got into the car with the kidnapped girl and drove away.
Just half an hour later, Bobby's mother, who lived nearby, came to check on her daughter. She found her still alive, unconscious, on the floor in a huge pool of blood. Bobbie was clutching a strand of blonde hair in her hands. The woman panicked. She called 911 and started screaming into the phone that her pregnant daughter's stomach had exploded. The ambulance arrived very quickly, but it was not possible to save Bobby — she died on the way to the hospital.
At the same time, the killer was quietly driving home to Kansas. In the back seat of her car was a child who had been born in a terrible way. On the way, Montgomery called her husband Kevin and told him that she had given birth to a girl. The husband did not know that Lisa could not have children, and his wife lied to him that she was pregnant. The "woman in labor" asked her husband to pick her up with the child near the clinic and take her home.
The staging went well and soon Lisa and the girl, who was named Abigail, were at home. And the very next day, December 17, 2004, Lisa and Kevin invited relatives and friends to visit to show them the newborn. Some of the visitors were surprised that the girl was so small, obviously premature. But in general, the child felt good, despite the monstrous way of being born.
Lisa Montgomery was arrested the same day. The murder was so horrific that the FBI took care of it and it took less than a day to find the killer. The first and only suspect appeared in the case immediately after the agents looked through Bobby Joe's mail. It was not difficult to determine that Darlene Fisher and Lisa Montgomery are one person. The killer did not even think about the fact that she could be identified by her IP address and did not try to cover her tracks.
During the investigation, several strange details surfaced. Lisa's husband claimed that he was sure of his wife's pregnancy. He said that he and his wife tried to have a child together three times. Two attempts, according to him, ended in abortions for medical reasons. Allegedly, doctors forbade the woman to give birth because of her health condition. For Kevin, the testimony of Lisa's first husband, who told about sterilization, was a shock.
Karl Boman also said that despite the operation, Lisa repeatedly told him about the pregnancy. Shortly before the murder of Bobby Joe, she called her ex-husband and mockingly promised to prove that she was capable of giving birth. All this was taken up by Montgomery's lawyers, who tried to prove her insanity. They insisted that a difficult childhood, rape, beatings and alcoholism deprived Lisa of her mind.
But the court did not accept these arguments. An examination was conducted, which showed that Lisa, although mentally unstable, was aware of her actions. The jury sentenced the murderer to death. In the USA, the execution of the sentence has been waiting for more than one year. So it was with Montgomery. She has been waiting for execution for almost 15 years. It was postponed twice due to the coronavirus pandemic. But in January 2021, the killer was still given a lethal injection. Lisa was 52 years old at the time of her death.