Missouri executes transgender person for 2003 murder

Amber McLaughlin, who was convicted of a murder in 2003 and unsuccessfully petitioned the governor for clemency, was executed by lethal injection in Missouri on Tuesday, marking the first openly transgender person to be put to death in the United States.

"McLaughlin was pronounced dead at 6:51 p.m.," the Missouri Department of Corrections said in a written statement.

"I am sorry for what I did," wrote McLaughlin in her final statement, which was released by the department of corrections. "I am a loving & caring person."

49-year-old McLaughlin and her legal team had petitioned Republican Governor Mike Parson for clemency, pleading with him to commute her death sentence. They assert that McLaughlin has demonstrated real remorse, and has battled an intellectual handicap, mental health problems, and a history of childhood trauma, aside from the fact that a jury could not agree on the death penalty.

However, Parson's office said in a statement on Tuesday that the execution would go according to schedule. The statement read that Beverly Guenther's family and loved ones "deserve peace."

"The State of Missouri will carry out McLaughlin's sentence according to the Court's order," Parson said, "and deliver justice."

According to McLaughlin's federal public defender Larry Komp and the governor's office, McLaughlin, who is listed as Scott McLaughlin in court documents, had not requested a legal name change or transition and was being held at the Potosi Correctional Center near St. Louis, which housed male inmates, because he was on death row.

According to court documents, McLaughlin was given the death penalty for the murder of Guenther in November 2003.

Prior to the death, the two had been dating; however, they had since broken up, and Guenther had an order of protection against McLaughlin after she was detained for breaking into Guenther's house.

A few weeks later, when the injunction was still in force, according to court documents, McLaughlin waited for Guenther outside the victim's place of business. Blood splatters in the parking lot and Guenther's truck were used as evidence by the prosecution throughout the trial that McLaughlin repeatedly stabbed and sexually assaulted Guenther.

According to court records, a jury found McLaughlin guilty of first-degree murder, forcible rape, and armed criminal action.

However, the jury couldn't agree on a sentence.

Missouri does not need a jury to unanimously vote to recommend or inflict the capital penalty, unlike the majority of US states that do. State law stipulates that when a jury cannot reach a verdict on the death sentence, the judge must choose between the death penalty and life in prison without the possibility of parole. The death penalty was imposed by McLaughlin's trial judge.

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