Thaindian News

Sep 20 (THAINDIAN NEWS) Governor Bob McDonnel of Virginia has denied the appeal of Teresa Lewis, and announced on Friday that he has decided not to issue a stay of execution for the first woman to be facing the death penalty in the state for over a century, and in the country in over five years.

Her crime was outlined very well by Time writers Katy Steinmetz and Alex Altman: “After midnight on Oct. 30, 2002, two men crept into an unlocked trailer in Pittsylvania County, Virginia. A family of three was sleeping. Toting shotguns, the intruders roused Teresa Lewis, now 40, and told her to leave the bedroom she shared with her husband Julian.

One of the men shot Julian several times. The other intruder stalked down the hall and put five bullets into Julian’s son, C.J., a U.S. Army reservist. The intruders divvied up the cash in Julian’s wallet and fled the trailer. About 45 minutes later, Teresa Lewis called the police to report that her husband and stepson had been killed.

But when the police arrived, Julian Lewis was still alive. Among his last words was an ominous accusation: “My wife knows who done this to me.”

She did. As detailed in court documents, Teresa Lewis had paid the shooters — Matthew Shallenberger, 22, and Rodney Fuller, 19 — to kill her husband and stepson.”

The forty-one year old woman pleaded guilty back in 2003 to two counts of murder for hire and is scheduled to die by lethal injection at 9 pm on Thursday night at the Greensville Correctional Center unless there is an intervention by the United States Supreme Court.