Missouri poised to execute first openly transgender woman on death row

Tuesday will bring the first execution of an openly transgender woman in the U.S. unless clemency comes at the last minute.

Amber McLaughlin, 49, is scheduled to die by lethal injection over the 2003 murder of Beverly Guenther, a former girlfriend. McLaughlin was convicted in 2006 and began transitioning while behind bars.

In 2003, Guenther obtained a restraining order against McLaughlin, but she was murdered and McLaughlin led police to where Guenther’s body was dumped near the Mississippi River in St. Louis.

Gov. Mike Parson will ultimately decide whether to grant McLaughlin’s request of clemency or not.

McLaughlin’s attorney Larry Komp filed a clemency request in December that focuses on her traumatic childhood and other information that the jury did not hear during her trial, including multiple child abuse incidents by foster and adoptive parents. The request also states that McLaughlin has depression and gender dysphoria and has attempted suicide multiple times.

Jessica Hicklin, 43, a former inmate who successfully sued the Missouri Department of Corrections to get hormone therapy for inmates who had not started transitioning before being imprisoned, mentored McLaughlin after she started transitioning three years ago.

“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.

She added that McLaughlin worries constantly about her well-being.

“Definitely a vulnerable person,” Hicklin said. “Definitely afraid of being assaulted or victimized, which is more common for trans folks in Department of Corrections.”

Missouri has only executed one other woman in its history. Bonnie B. Heady was put to death in the gas chamber along with accomplice Carl Austin Hall on on Dec. 18, 1953 for kidnapping and killing a 6-year-old boy.

With News Wire Services