GA Executes Inmate Despite Pope’s Plea

Georgia death-row inmate Kelly Renee Gissendaner was executed at 12:21 a.m. Wednesday after the U.S. Supreme Court denied three last-minute applications for clemency. Gissendaner, who was on death row for her involvement in the 1997 murder of her husband, was the first woman to be executed in the state in the past 70 years. The Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles had also denied clemency to the 47-year-old, despite a plea from Pope Francis. After speaking out against the death penalty in an address to Congress, Pope Francis asked the parole board in Georgia to spare her life. Gissendaner sobbed as she called the victim an “amazing man who died because of me.” Witnesses said she sang “Amazing Grace” until she was given a lethal injection.