Teresa Lewis, 41, was executed die by lethal injection. (AP) Posted on 09/23/2010 8:23:49 PM PDT by Inappropriate Laughter
Teresa Lewis, 41, was executed die by lethal injection. (AP)
JARRATT, Va., Sept. 23 - Teresa Lewis, who plotted with a young lover to kill her husband and stepson for insurance money, became the first woman executed in Virginia in nearly 100 years Thursday night when she was killed by lethal injection.
Authorities pronounced Lewis dead at 9:13 p.m.
Lewis's case generated passion and interest across the world. The European Union asked Virginia Gov. Robert F. McDonnell (R) to commute her sentence to life, citing her mental capacity. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad cited the case at an appearance in New York.
It began on an October night nearly eight years ago, when Lewis prayed with her husband, slipped into bed next to him and waited for her two conspirators to come inside the door she had left unlocked. The two men showed up about 3:15 a.m., opened fire, then fled.
After the shooting, Lewis waited about half an hour to call 911. Her stepson, Charles "C.J." Lewis, died quickly. But her husband, Julian Lewis, whose body was riddled with bird shot, was alive and moaning "baby, baby, baby" when police arrived.
SNIP
Lewis is the 12th woman to be executed in the United States since capital punishment was reinstated in 1976. The most recent was in Texas in 2005, when Frances Newton was killed by lethal injection for shooting her husband and two children.
On Saturday, Lewis was moved to the Greensville Correctional Center, site of Virginia's death house. She requested her final meal: fried chicken, sweet peas with butter, German chocolate cake and Dr. Pepper, corrections officials said.
Her supporters never said that Lewis was innocent or that she shouldn't be punished. But they said she did not deserve to die because she was borderline mentally retarded,...
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
99.9999% of people with IQs as low or lower don’t wind up as murderers.
Absolutely right. She’s a murderer. What does her sex have to do with it?
She was not mentally retarded and even if she was most retarded people don’t scheme to commit murder.
she had developed an addiction to pain medication
She set up the situation so the visually challenged young man, who she was screwing, could creep up on and murder her defensless husband while she laid in bed next to him. That certainly sounds cold blooded; but maybe she was just misunderstood. She earned the needle. Hopefully, she made her peace with The Lord.
If premeditated murder isn't reason enough for the death penalty,you must be a modern liberal.
At a large law firm in the city, some of the lawyers did “pro bono” work defending death row inmates. One was a drug dealer who murdered a number of people, men and women, including torturing them to death by injecting battery acid. The lawyers were pursuing this diminished mental capacity angle.
This was treated as if the lawyers were doing noble work. I guess the victims’ families would have been told to go jump in the lake if they came begging for help.
No, no, no. She'll win the AA for a sympathetic portrayal. It wouldn't be Hollywood if the husband isn't shown as the blackheart he really was and the "wife" as the innocent victim, ignored by the misogynist powers-that-be and forced into taking things into her own hands.
I couldn’t agree with you more.
well said
I remember the situation with the woman in Texas back in the early 2000s, we should have the right to life and liberty. But if you take another life... you are taking that right away from yourself.
I hope she really changed and made peace with her maker. God will sort these things out.
Her weapons were money, an address and an unlocked door. Those men would not have been there without her instigation.
Neither did Manson.
Maybe a "Lifetime" movie.
I would have been ok with commuting her sentence to hanging, or a firing squad or the guillotine or burning at the stake, but lethal injection is ok. But, there’s just not any pain involved - murderers deserve to feel enormous pain as they leave.
Burnt at the stake would be my choice, perhaps burnt at the STEAK - make mine a ribeye, medium rare and bake me a potato and a murderer! Sour cream and butter too.
I don’t think it matters that she didn’t pull the trigger. Because of her evil actions 2 men are dead. I think her execution is the correct action for the state to take.
My wife watches those Lifetime movies..
Ever notice how the bad guys are almost always white men. always... lilly white skin
She asked for her stepson to also be killed and it is speculated that this is because she did not want to share the insurance money with him when he returned from the National Guards.
She let the killers into the home the night of the murder and drank an iced tea while her husband and stepson were murdered in their beds. When her stepson was gravely wounded but not dead, Teresa picked up a shotgun and handed it to one of the killers and suggested it would complete the job.
She also delayed calling 9-1-1 as her husband lay bleeding to death, but did go through searching his wallet for money.
she did manage to graduate from high school and spent a semester at college.
She was “suffering” so much in prison that she managed to gain a hundred or so pounds!
Yeah, reading that made me sick. How horrible for that poor man.
I agree with you. Now those guys that killed that family..they should fry. It just seems it’s doled out so arbitrarily. I used to be for it, but after watching THE INNOCENCE PROJECT about people falsely accused of a crime, several who were on death row, I’m now against it.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.