Kelly Gissendaner

Kelly Renée Gissendaner (née Brookshire; March 8, 1968 – September 30, 2015) was an American woman who was executed by the U.S. state of Georgia. Gissendaner had been convicted of orchestrating the murder of her husband, Douglas Gissendaner (December 14, 1966 – February 7, 1997). At the time of the murder, Gissendaner was 28, and her husband was 30. After her conviction, and until her execution, Gissendaner was the only woman on death row in Georgia.

Gissendaner was born into a poor cotton-farming family.

According to sworn affidavits by friends and family members, she was molested by her stepfather and other men during her childhood and adolescence. During her senior year of high school, she reported being date raped. Nine months later, her first son was born. In 1987, at the age of 19, Kelly Gissendaner married her first husband Jeff Banks. They stayed together for six months.

Kelly married Douglas Gissendaner for the first time on September 2, 1989. They had a baby together, lost their jobs, and moved in with Kelly's mother. Douglas joined the Army and they were sent to Germany. Kelly became pregnant by another man who later died of cancer. She and Douglas were divorced in 1993. In May 1995, she remarried Douglas. In December 1996, the couple bought a house together in Auburn, Georgia.

Kelly, in addition to her daughter with Douglas, had two sons. Douglas was the stepfather to her sons.

On February 7, 1997, Gregory Bruce Owen (born March 17, 1971) hid near the couple's home in Auburn. When Douglas arrived, Owen forced Douglas into his car at knifepoint and drove him to a wooded area in Gwinnett County near Harbins Park. After striking Douglas in the head with a nightstick, Owen stabbed Douglas in the neck and back multiple times. When Kelly arrived at the scene moments later, the two set fire to her husband's car and hid the body in the woods.

Before trial, prosecutors offered both Owen and Gissendaner a chance to accept responsibility for the murder and plead guilty and then receive a sentence of life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years. Owen accepted the offer while Gissendaner rejected it and went on trial.

Gissendaner was convicted of orchestrating her husband's murder and sentenced to death in 1998 after Owen testified against her in a plea agreement in which he was sentenced to life imprisonment with the possibility of parole after 25 years. Owen told a jury that Gissendaner had first approached him about "a way to get rid of" her husband three months before the murder. He had suggested that Gissendaner just get a divorce instead, but she refused, believing that murder was the only way to get Douglas out of her life and still get the house and a payoff from his life insurance policy. During the trial, Gissendaner was discovered to have threatened witnesses and also plotted to pay a witness to commit perjury.