US woman executed in Georgia, despite papal appeal: Official

The US state of Georgia executed its first woman in 70 years early on Sept.30, despite an appeal for clemency by Pope Francis.

Kelly Gissendaner, 47, made a statement and requested a prayer before she was put to death by lethal injection after a flurry of last minute appeals.
 
"At 12:21 am (0441 GMT) the court-ordered execution of Kelly Gissendaner was carried out in accordance with state law," said Gwendolyn Hogan, a spokeswoman for the Georgia Department of Corrections.
 
Gissendaner was the first woman to be executed in the southern state since 1945, and the 16th nationwide since the Supreme Court re-established the death penalty in 1976.
 
She was sentenced to death after being found guilty of conspiring to murder her husband in 1997.
 
Her execution was initially scheduled for 7 pm on Sept.29 (2300 GMT), but was delayed as her lawyers sought an 11th hour reprieve in filings before a federal court of appeals, the Georgia Supreme Court and the US Supreme Court, to no avail.
 
Dozens of supporters and death penalty opponents kept vigil outside the state prison in Jackson, Georgia as Gissendaner awaited her fate.
 
"If you wanted proof that the death penalty is torture, look no further than #KellyGissendaner waiting hours to see if she'll live or die," Helen Prejean, a Catholic nun and anti-death penalty advocate, wrote on her Twitter account.
         
Hers was the first execution of a US inmate since Pope Francis called for the global abolition of the death penalty in his speech to the US Congress last week.
 
The pope's personal representative sent a letter to Georgia's parole board on Sept.29 making "an urgent appeal" to commute Gissendaner's sentence to "one that would...