A federal judge in November postponed Montgomery's execution from Dec. 8 until Jan. 12 to give her attorneys more time to file her clemency petition, after concluding that their COVID-19 symptoms limited their ability to file thepetition. The nature and circumstances of Montgomerys crime show she had lost touch with reality, says her half-sister, Diane Mattingly. Violent acts against pregnant women and their fetuses fall into that category. Ramachandran said women who sufferchildhood sexual abuse and whose minds revolve around babies and pregnancy are predisposed to suffering pseudocyesis, a condition in which they show physical symptoms of pregnancy, including enlargement of the breasts and stomach, morning sickness and cravings for certain foods. "While my path to healing was very hard, the difference between Lisa and me is that no one ever intervened to rescue Lisa from a lifetime of abuse.". "And then go, 'Look at this body'. It has been the subject of two books, multiple true crime television shows, documentaries and countless podcast episodes. To help keep her mind occupied, Henry said, Montgomery was initially given one crayon and one piece of paper, but nothing else. Every year. She had four children in less than four years before being sterilized. Her lawyers had argued she was a mentally ill victim of abuse who. In recommending execution, the jury spelled out six aggravating factors supporting capital punishment. People confuse punishment with culpability, she went on. Residents there tend to think her execution would bring an appropriate end to a painful chapter in their city's history, he said. Zella Gwin survives. Its also people hearing it, knowing it and doing nothing about it. In her opinion, Montgomerys extreme childhood trauma created the conditions for her to grow into an adult with a disconnected sense of her emotions, a tenuous hold on reality, a completely warped view of human relationships, and a split and damaged sense of herself and of her body, according to expert testimony she provided for the defense. In what Mattingly described as the most lucky thing to ever happen to her, she was placed with a loving foster family who showered her with affection. When Stinnett answered the door, Montgomery overpowered the pregnant woman, strangled her with a piece of rope, and cut the baby out of her womb. The U.S. has not executed a woman in 67 years. Read about our approach to external linking. Im not a psychiatrist, so I cant go any further than that.. Teddy Kleiner, the son of Shaughnessy and Jack Kleiner, was 45 years old when he was fatally shot in 2019 in North Topeka. Mattingly said she and Montgomery share the same father, John Patterson, a decorated Vietnam War veteran whonever married Mattingly's mother. The couple had three children in rapid succession. Montgomerys mother, Judy Shaughnessy, who was 20 at the time of her birth in 1968, drank heavily while pregnant with her daughter. She lives near Kansas City, Mo. Judy ultimately married six times, and had multiple partners throughout Lisa's childhood. In her interviews with Montgomery, Porterfield said, the woman showed symptoms of dissociation, including confused thinking, major gaps in memory, and an inability to recognize the reality of certain events. After Mattingly was removed from the home by social services, Montgomery fell prey to her mother's new husband, who according to statements from his other children, was a violent alcoholic who began sexually abusing Montgomery when she was a pre-teen. She was sick. Montgomery is "evil personified," he said. Other friends of Kleiner, including a plumber and an electrician, raped her in that shed, Montgomery says, as a way of collecting payment for work done around the house. Patterson was transferred after Montgomerys birth to Fort Riley inKansas, where their family lived when another daughter was born in 1970. Montgomery also talked about the abuseshe had endured from her stepfather, Jack Kleiner, and the first of her two husbands, Carl Boman, Dorr said. Today, residents are tired of Melvernbeing connected with Lisa Montgomery, said current Mayor Lyndon Weddle, who describesMelvern asafriendlyrural community where people wave when they pass each other. But it was not a pet that she was to retrieve that day. But it wasn't Montgomery that Stinnett was expecting, it was a woman who went by the name of Darlene Fischer. A lifetime of sexual torture causes her to lose touch with reality. "As a result, Lisa has trouble processing information and navigating social relationships. "She was completely detached from reality.". He married Judy Shaughnessy, who would become Montgomery's mother, in 1967 in . Prosecutors, in their closing argument, said that she had a filthy home, that she didnt cook and that she didnt clean, Babcock said. The couple had four children in five years, but the relationship was not the escape from violence that Montgomery might have hoped it would be. However, the executions ordered by President Trump are continuing. Diane Mattingly is the sister of Lisa Montgomery, who is scheduled for execution by the federal government on December 8, 2020. Lisa Montgomery and her half-sister Diane Mattingly as children, Judy Shaughnessy, Lisa Montgomery's mother, Bobbie Jo Stinnett's home lies empty today, Protest against federal executions of death row inmates - outside the US Justice Department, Washington DC, December 2020. Sheriff Strong insists that the crime was meticulously planned and that the woman he arrested continued to lie until backed into a corner. He had a daughter from a previous relationship, Diane, who was four years older than Montgomery. Her children even came up with a nickname to pull her out of her trances when she was unresponsive: They called her Martha instead of mom to get her attention. . Friends and family began noticing Montgomery's tendency to slip into "a world of her own". I never molested her in any way, shape or form, said Kleiner, who died in 2009. Meanwhile, her mother in 1985 had married Richard Boman, whose son Montgomery's stepbrother, Carl Boman got Montgomery pregnant. Her story quickly fell apart and she confessed to the killing. Montgomery's second husband Kevin Montgomery, who lives near Melvern and remains married to her voiced support for her bid for clemency in a statement releasedthrough his wife's attorneys. When Montgomery was in her mid-teens,she was sexually assaulted by Kleiner and three or four of his friends, according to court records. My heart goes out to the family of Bobbie Jo Stinnett and the loss that they have felt and are still feeling. "I don't think people understand how bad this was," Strong said. In addition to her brain damage, Lisa developed multiple mental disorders, including bipolar disorder, temporal lobe epilepsy, dissociative disorder, and Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. In closing arguments, assistant U.S. Attorney Matt Whitworth asked the jury to think about Stinnett's daughter, Victoria Jo Stinnett. Recently, there has been a virus outbreak on death row at the institution, and previous executions have been linked to outbreaks among the execution team and prison staff. In asking for mercy, her family members and attorneys say the untreated trauma she experienced as a child exacerbated her brain damage and hergenetic disposition to severe mental illness, leading her to kill Stinnett during a psychotic episode a dissociative state similar to sleepwalking. When I was eight and Lisa was four, social services came and rescued me from Judy, leaving Lisa and our other sister behind. Montgomery's father, John Patterson, a 25-year-old in the military, was also an alcoholic. Montgomery suffered from pseudocyesis, the false belief she was pregnant, jurors heard from Vilayanur S. Ramachandran, director of the Center of Brain and Cognition at the University of California in San Diego. Around this time, she repeatedly claimed to be pregnant again, although she had undergone sterilisation after her fourth baby was born. The baby girl survived, andMontgomery took her home and briefly passed her off as her own until investigators arrested her the next day. Montgomery claimed to live in northwest Missouri. She missed the funeral because of it. Mattingly said she shielded her half-sister from random baby-sitters, often older men, whom their mother left with them during her near-nightly outings to a local bar. Mattingly was 8 years old and Montgomery was 4 when Mattingly was removed in 1972 from Shaughnessy's mobile home at Ogden, a community of about 1,960 people in Riley County. As a teenager, Montgomery confided in her cousin, a deputy sheriff, that she was being raped by Kleiner and other men orally, vaginally and anally. Shaughnessy drank excessively during her pregnancy, causing brain damage to Montgomery, according to court records. Porterfield compared the chronic abuse to pouring lighter fluid onto a spark. More: Lisa Montgomery's execution, delayed by attorneys' COVID-19 cases, rescheduled for Jan. 12. For Diane Mattingly, there is one moment from her childhood for which she feels both enormous gratitude and guilt. A social worker found Lisa's allegations of abuse credible and turned the file. I didn't know what to do or how to talk to my sister about it.". Randy Strong, who investigated the case,is unhappy that some people are asking thatMontgomerys life be spared. At state level, the number of sentences and executions continues a historic decline. Some nights, she said, Shaughnessy would leave them in the house with a male babysitter. Bobbie Jo's mother and husband have have not spoken publicly in many years. Mattingly has enjoyed a "blessed life," she said. "It was violent and like a scene out of a horror movie," he said. Melvern residents want that perception to end, she said. Tommy Kleiner and Montgomery have stayed in touch. Shaughnessy's nephew, David Kidwell, testified that she believed Montgomery "had brought [the abuse] on herself, that she enticed him". Montgomery was already vulnerable to serious mental illness, she added. If her execution goes forward, she will be the first federal female inmate to be executed in almost 70 years. Multiple medical experts have given statements agreeing with that diagnosis. Nodaway County Sheriff Randy Strong says that the scene that he and his four colleagues found that day was so bloody, they are still traumatised by it. After previously being allowed contact with a limited number of inmates, Montgomery was moved to a solitary confinement cell at Carswell and kept there 24 hours a day, seven days a week, Henry said. "They made this a priority at the risk of the health and lives of corrections officials, of the prisoners on death row, and the communities that all of those Bureau of Prisons officials who flew in from across the country were returning to," says Ngozi Ndulue, senior director of research and special projects at the Death Penalty Information Center. As a teenager, Montgomery confided in a cousin, telling him the men would tie her up, beat her and even urinate on her afterwards. "I would say, 'President Trump, I want you to look at the life that Lisa had led, I want to look at all the people that have failed her, I want you to look at the rape, the torture, the mental abuse, the physical abuse that this woman had endured,'" she says. Babies born naturally tend to have misshapen heads initially because of the pressure experienced as they go through the birth canal, he said. Only 18 death sentences were handed down in 2020 and the number of executions carried out hit a 30-year low. At 18, Judy pressured Lisa to marry her stepbrother. Her mother, Judy Shaughnessy, beat and tormented all of her children, proudly telling an investigator that her daughter's first sentence was "Don't spank me, it hurts." Montgomery's first stepfather . Montgomery's mother, Judy Shaughnessy, told The . "The other sister stayed in that situation, and it got worse and worse and worse. She had catfished Stinnett online under a fake name. Shaughnessy was cruel and violent to both girls, according to a sworn statement from Patterson, who reported feeling ashamed that he did not step in to stop the abuse. Montgomery, her sister said, was repeatedly failed: by the deputy sheriff who was told of her abuse; by the judge who was aware she was being molested; by her trial. Since 2008, Montgomery has been held in a federal prison in Texas for female inmates with special medical and psychological needs, where she has been receiving psychiatric care. They slept in twin beds in a small bedroomand fell asleep most nights holding hands, Mattingly said. "If I had, would they have taken Lisa out of the home also?" Montgomery was left behind with her mother. "Judy was manipulative and - I hate to use this word, but - evil. By multiple accounts, Kleiner was an erratic, violent man who beat the kids and his wife regularly. Kleiner and Shaughnessy divorced in 1985, with Shaughnessy contending she once walked in on Kleiner and Montgomery having sex. [N]ot only was it bizarre behavior, but it was very embarrassing for me as her daughter, she said. I couldn't believe how good it felt to be part of a loving family. Her lawyers had argued she was a mentally ill victim of abuse who deserved mercy. Montgomery also suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder, bipolar disorder and major depression, jurors were told. There are things children need to grow into healthy adults, among them love, praise and stability. Montgomery has exhausted all attempts to appeal her conviction and death sentence although her attorneys are exploring possible litigation. He was being held in the Shawnee County Jail in 2018 when he filed a federal lawsuit contending the county was violating his constitutional rights by preventing him from sending letters to Montgomery. She liked to take her finger and poke it hard into her chest, over and over in the same spot. Who was the last woman executed by the US government? She had this ability to find what hurt you the most and use that against you, Mattingly said. Those were disconnections that were tragic in their consequences. Read about our approach to external linking. Only around 2% of inmates on death row are women. He testified that Montgomery had been in a dissociative state, or "mental fog," at the time. "The people that are defending [Montgomery], I wish I could take them back in time, and put them in that room," he says. Lawyer Kelley Henry says one of the things that disturbs her most is that adults in positions of authority were told about what was going on but did nothing. In the haze of her mental illness, she went to the home of a pregnant woman, killed her, and removed the baby. A longtime death penalty opponent, Wurtz said he considers it "idiotic" that Montgomery is to be executed. Mattingly, Montgomerys sister, is planning on visiting her next week. As an adult, Montgomerys dysfunctional life mimicked that of her childhood. She testified as. Nobody has said that Lisa should never have been punished. "I get these images in my head of [Bobbie Jo's mother] finding her daughter that way.". Her lawyers are pursuing an insanity defense. Lisa Montgomery - the only female inmate on federal death row in the US - has been executed for murder in the state of Indiana. "It was pretty awful.". Several high-profile figures had appealed for clemency in Brandon's case but Mr Trump did not heed those calls. "There were so many opportunities where people could have intervened and prevented this," says Henry. "I'm asking him to have compassion on her as a person that has been failed over and over and over again. Montgomerys father, John Patterson, a 25-year-old in the military, was also an alcoholic. Shaughnessy would beat Mattingly with whatever was in her hand, be it a belt or a broom, she said. It makes him even angrier that it was Stinnett's mother who discovered her that way. Mattingly said Patterson was often away, and Shaughnessy became increasingly abusive toward them, at times forcing Mattingly to eat raw onions as punishment and go outdoors into the cold naked. Henry said Montgomery seemed out of touch with reality when Henry and Harwell, who work in Tennessee, traveled by plane to visit her in October and early November at Fort Worth. One of the lead investigators in the case, Randy Strong, wants Montgomery executed. Montgomery and Carl Boman divorced, remarried and divorced again in 1998. For Montgomery, her lawyers argue, it began before she was born. View the profiles of people named Judy Shaughnessy. She was born in 1968, the child of two troubled alcoholics. A lifelong opponent of the death penalty, Dorr said she wants the world to know about Lisa Montgomery the person. One theory her lawyers put forward regarding the chain of events that led to the murder, is that Montgomery feared her ex-husband would expose her lies about being pregnant and use it against her as he sought custody of their children. Montgomerys entire life was marked by people who failed to protect her, Babcock said. That could change in Terre Haute. Victims of severe childhood sexual abuse can overcome their trauma with certain factors, Porterfield said, such as the presence of a nurturing adult who provides love and connects them to resources to promote healing. He thanked the sheriff for recovering his daughter and allowing him to be the parent that his wife couldn't be. The couple returned to their home near Melvern, which was being watched by investigators working to identify the woman who had told Stinnett she was Darlene Fischer. Lisa Montgomery is no different. As long as she was given cigarettes, Montgomery continued to talk, Strong said. They had been called in as part of the Northwest Missouri Major Case Squad, which was workingwith the FBI to identify Stinnett's killer and find the missing child. Judy Shaughnessy and her boyfriend physical, psychological and sexual abuse Lisa. While the court admonished her for not reporting it to authorities, they did not report it either. He also noted that after she confessed to killing Stinnett, she changed her story to contend the murder was committed by her half-brotherTommy Kleiner. "The Lisa I knew was a good person who cared about the other women in the pod and was quiet and generous and kind," Dorr said. 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