Murder Convict Could Be First Woman Executed in Ga. in 70 Years

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An execution date has been set for Kelly Renee Gissendaner, the Auburn, Ga., woman who was convicted in the 1997 murder of her husband in Gwinnett County, the state attorney general’s office said.

• Update: Clemency Hearing Set for Auburn Woman on Death Row

Gissendaner could be the first woman in 70 years to be executed by the state of Georgia. She is currently the only woman on death row in the state.

Attorney General Sam Olens said Gissendaner is scheduled to be executed at 7 p.m. Feb. 25, 2015. The Superior Court of Gwinnett County filed an order on Monday, Feb. 9, setting a seven-day window for the execution, ending at noon on March 4, Olens said in a press advisory.

“Gissendaner has concluded her direct appeal proceedings and her state and federal habeas corpus proceedings,” the advisory stated.

Gissendaner was convicted in 1998 of convincing her boyfriend Gregory Owen to murder Douglas Gissendaner on Feb. 7, 1997. She then went to lengths to deny her involvement.

Owen, who was sentenced life in prison, avoided the death penalty by helping prosecutors in the case against Gissendaner, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.

• See a detailed account of the case on the Georgia Attorney General’s Office website

Authorities said Douglas Gissendaner, a Desert Storm veteran, was beaten and stabbed to death by Owen in a wooded area off Luke Edwards Road near Dacula. The body was found two weeks later.

According to facts presented in the case, Owen was waiting for Douglas Gissendaner to return home from a night with church friends, and then took him by knifepoint to a secluded area on Luke Edwards Road. Owen forced the man to his knees, then beat him with a night stick and stabbed him multiple times in the head and neck. Owen took Douglas Gissendaner’s ring and watch to make it appear it was a robbery.

The attorney general’s office said Kelly Gissendaner arrived at the scene as the stabbing occurred, and the two took her husband’s vehicle and set it on fire within a mile of the murder scene.

Gissendaner appeared on local television asking for information on her husband’s whereabouts, but authorities said she “basically continued business as usual, even going back to work” in the days after the murder. She gave conflicting stories during interviews with investigators, saying at first there were no marital problems and later admitting to an extra-marital affair with Owen.

Owen confessed to the crime on Feb. 24 and implicated Gissendaner, who was arrested the next day.

Authorities said while in jail Gissendaner told a friend that Owen threatened to kill her and her family if she told anybody about the murder, and she also tried to hire someone to “who would falsely confess to holding Gissendaner at gunpoint and making her go to the crime scene on the night of the murder.”

Gissendaner was convicted by jury trial on Nov. 18, 1998.

If the execution is carried out if will be the first time since March 5, 1945, a woman will have been put to death in Georgia, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported. Lena Baker, a black maid, was convicted in the shooting death of her white boss. She was found guilty by an all-white jury and sent to the electric chair. She was pardoned by the state in 2005, the newspaper reported.

Gissendaner is currently incarcerated at the Arrendale State Prison in Alto, Ga.

(Photo: Kelly Renee Gissendaner; Georgia Dept. of Corrections)