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Associated Press

Unless Missouri Governor Mike Parson grants clemency, Amber McLaughlin, 49, will become the first transgender woman executed in the US. She is scheduled to die by injection on Tuesday for killing a former girlfriend in 2003.
McLaughlin’s lawyer, Larry Komp, said there are no court appeals pending.
The clemency request focuses on several issues, including McLaughlin’s traumatic childhood and mental health issues, which the jury never heard in her trial. A foster parent rubbed faeces in her face when she was a toddler and her adoptive father used a stun gun on her, according to the clemency petition.
It says she suffers from depression and attempted suicide multiple times.

Tomorrow, the State of Missouri is slated to execute #AmberMcLaughlin. Amber will be the first trans woman to be executed nationally, as well as the first woman executed in MO since 1976.
Join @MADPMO in urging Gov. Parson to grant Amber clemency! #EndTheDeathPenalty pic.twitter.com/tVPu4PUelR
— Kendall Martinez-Wright (@KendallKaniMW) January 2, 2023

The petition also includes reports citing a diagnosis of gender dysphoria, a condition that causes anguish and other symptoms as a result of a disparity between a person’s gender identity and their assigned sex at birth.
“We think Amber has demonstrated incredible courage because I can tell you there’s a lot of hate when it comes to that issue,” her lawyer, Larry Komp, said on Monday. But, he said, McLaughlin’s sexual identity is “not the main focus” of the clemency request.
Parson’s spokeswoman, Kelli Jones, said the review process for the clemency request is still under way.
There is no known case of a transgender inmate being executed in the US before, according to the anti-execution Death Penalty Information Centre. A friend in prison says she saw McLaughlin’s personality blossom during her gender transition.
US executes first woman in 67 years, after last-minute legal wrangling
Before transitioning, McLaughlin was in a relationship with girlfriend Beverly Guenther.
McLaughlin would show up at the suburban St Louis office where the 45-year-old Guenther worked, sometimes hiding inside the building, according to court records. Guenther obtained a restraining order, and police officers occasionally escorted her to her car after work.
Guenther’s neighbours called police the night of November 20, 2003, when she failed to return home. Officers went to the office building, where they found a broken knife handle near her car and a trail of blood. A day later, McLaughlin led police to a location near the Mississippi River in St. Louis, where the body had been dumped.
McLaughlin was convicted of first-degree murder in 2006. A judge sentenced McLaughlin to death after a jury was deadlocked on the sentence. A court in 2016 ordered a new sentencing hearing, but a federal appeal court panel reinstated the death penalty in 2021.




One person who knew Amber before she transitioned is Jessica Hicklin, 43, who spent 26 years in prison for a drug-related killing in western Missouri in 1995. She was 16. Because of her age when the crime occurred, she was granted release in January 2022.
Hicklin, 43, began transitioning while in prison and in 2016 sued the Missouri Department of Corrections, challenging a policy that prohibited hormone therapy for inmates who weren’t receiving it before being incarcerated. She won the lawsuit in 2018 and became a mentor to other transgender inmates, including McLaughlin.
Though imprisoned together for around a decade, Hicklin said McLaughlin was so shy they rarely interacted. But as McLaughlin began transitioning about three years ago, she turned to Hicklin for guidance on issues such as mental health counselling and getting help to ensure her safety inside a male-dominated maximum-security prison.
“There’s always paperwork and bureaucracy, so I spent time helping her learn to file the right things and talk to the right people,” Hicklin said. In the process, a friendship developed.
US state makes inmates choose electric chair or firing squad
“We would sit down once a week and have what I referred to as girl talk,” Hicklin said. “She always had a smile and a dad joke. If you ever talked to her, it was always with the dad jokes.”
They also discussed the challenges a transgender inmate faces in a male prison – things like how to obtain feminine items, dealing with rude comments, and staying safe.
McLaughlin still had insecurities, especially about her well-being, Hicklin said.
“Definitely a vulnerable person,” Hicklin said. “Definitely afraid of being assaulted or victimised, which is more common for trans folks in Department of Corrections.”

The only woman ever executed in Missouri was Bonnie B. Heady, put to death on December 18, 1953, for kidnapping and killing a six-year-old boy. Heady was executed in the gas chamber, side by side with the other kidnapper and killer, Carl Austin Hall.
Nationally, 18 people were executed in 2022, including two in Missouri. Kevin Johnson, 37, was put to death November 29 for the ambush killing of a Kirkwood, Missouri, police officer. Carman Deck was executed in May for killing James and Zelma Long during a robbery at their home in De Soto, Missouri.
Another Missouri inmate, Leonard Taylor, is scheduled to die on February 7 for killing his girlfriend and her three young children.
If you have suicidal thoughts, or you know someone who is, help is available. For Hong Kong, dial +852 2896 0000 for The Samaritans or +852 2382 0000 for Suicide Prevention Services. In the US, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline on +1 800 273 8255. For a list of other nations’ helplines, see this page.


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United States

US may execute openly transgender woman in first such case

US death row inmate Amber McLaughlin faces death by lethal injection on Tuesday. Photo:US Federal Public Defender Office via AP

Charles Keith stands outside the state prison in Florence, Arizona, where inmate Clarence Dixon was scheduled for execution by lethal injection in May 2022 for a murder conviction. Photo: AP

California court upholds death penalty for Hong Kong-born serial killer Charles Ng in 1980s sex slave murders

Serial killer Charles Ng in a Santa Ana, California, Superior Courtroom Wednesday, June 30, 1999, after being sentenced to die for 11 murders that took place in rural California in the mid-1980s. File photo: AP

Charles Ng in 2018. File photo: California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation 

A makeshift hideout where Charles Ng hid for a few days before his arrest in Calgary, Canada, in 1985. File photo: AP

Death row inmates in Japan sue to abolish ‘cruel’ execution by hanging

Inmates are seen through a hatch at a detention centre in Tokyo. Photo: Reuters

Inmates are seen through a hatch at a detention centre in Tokyo. Hanging has been Japan’s sole execution method for around a century and a half. Photo: Reuters

An execution chamber at a Japanese detention centre. Photo: Kyodo via Reuters

Britain’s Branson turns down Singapore’s offer to debate death penalty: ‘it reduces nuanced discourse to sound bites’

British billionaire Richard Branson urged Singapore Home Affairs and Law Minister K Shanmugam to engage local activists instead of holding a televised debate on the death penalty. Photo: Bloomberg

Singapore had invited Branson to a televised debate on its use of the death penalty with Home Affairs and Law Minister K Shanmugam. Photo: AFP

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World

United States & Canada

Amber McLaughlin, 49, is set to die by lethal injection on Tuesday for killing an ex-girlfriend in 2003
She is seeking clemency from Missouri Governor Mike Parson in a petition focusing on her traumatic childhood and mental health issues


Amber McLaughlin, 49, is set to die by lethal injection on Tuesday for killing an ex-girlfriend in 2003.


US may execute openly transgender woman in first such case

Amber McLaughlin, 49, is set to die by lethal injection on Tuesday for killing an ex-girlfriend in 2003 She is seeking clemency from Missouri Governor Mike Parson in a petition focusing on her traumatic childhood and mental health issues

Amber McLaughlin, 49, is set to die by lethal injection on Tuesday for killing an ex-girlfriend in 2003

She is seeking clemency from Missouri Governor Mike Parson in a petition focusing on her traumatic childhood and mental health issues