BONNE TERRE, Mo. (AP) – A Missouri inmate has been put to death for a 2003 killing, in what is believed to be the first execution of a transgender woman in the U.S. Amber McLaughlin was put to death Tuesday night, hours after Republican Gov. Mike Parson declined a clemency request. She was convicted of killing a former girlfriend in suburban St. Louis. A database on the website for the anti-execution Death Penalty Information Center shows that 1,558 people have been executed since the death penalty was reinstated in the mid-1970s. All but 17 of those put to death were men. The center says there are no known previous cases of an openly transgender inmate being executed.
