ST. LOUIS (AP) — Nearly 1,600 death row inmates have been put to death in the U.S. since 1977, but an execution scheduled in Missouri will be the first involving a transgender woman.
Amber McLaughlin is set to die Tuesday evening for stalking a former girlfriend and fatally stabbing her nearly 20 years ago.
Republican Gov. Mike Parson announced Tuesday that he would not halt the execution.
A database for the anti-execution Death Penalty Information Center shows 1,558 people have been executed since the death penalty was reinstated in the mid-1970s.
All but 17 of them were men.
The center says there were no known previous cases of an openly transgender inmate being executed..
