(Washington Insider Magazine) – McLaughlin, 49, was convicted of the violation and murder of his ex -girdle Beverly Guenther, in St. Louis County, and his execution is the first of 2023 in the United States and unpublished in the country being the only one until the time of A transgender woman.
“I regret what I did … I am a affectionate person,” said Amber McLaughlin, executed yesterday by a murder in 2003, considered the first execution of a transgender woman in the United States.
Stalking And Killing an ex -Girlfriend
McLaughlin, 49, was convicted of stalking and killing an ex -girlfriend and then throwing her body near the Mississippi river in St. Louis. McLaughlin’s fate was sealed early when Republican governor Mike Parson rejected a clemency application.
McLaughlin spoke quietly with a spiritual advisor to his side while injected Pentobarbital’s lethal dose. McLaughlin breathed deeply a couple of times and then closed his eyes. It was declared dead a few minutes later.
A database of the Death Penalty Information Center against execution shows that 1,558 people have been executed since the death penalty was restored in the mid -1970s.
As a last resort, Amber McLaughlin requested clemency to the governor of Missouri, Republican Mike Parson, but the politician denied it.
The defense cited the problems of mental health and traumatic childhood of McLaughlin, which the jury never heard during his trial. An adoptive father rubbed stool in his face when he was a little girl and his adoptive father used a paralyzing gun with her, according to the request. He cited severe depression that resulted in multiple suicide attempts, both as a child and adult.
The petition also included reports that cited a diagnosis of gender dysphoria, a condition that causes anguish and other symptoms as a result of a disparity between the gender identity of a person and their sex assigned to birth. But McLaughlin’s sexual identity “was not the main focus” of the clemency application, said his lawyer, Larry Komp.
Murder of Beverly Guenther
McLaughlin, 49, at that time as a man, was convicted of the violation and murder of his ex -girlfriend Beverly Guenther, in St. Louis County, committed in 2003.
McLaughlin was declared guilty of first degree murder in 2006. A judge condemned Mclaughlin to death after a jury reached a dead point in the sentence. In 2016, a court ordered a new sentence hearing, but a panel of a Federal Court of Appeals restored the death penalty in 2021.
This article is authored by Armando Hernandez.