Native American who STONED nine-year-old girl to death to be executed after arguing it would violate culture

THE only Native American on death row is scheduled to be executed Wednesday for the killings of a nine-year-old girl and her grandmother, but many Navajos are hoping for a last minute intervention.

The Navajo government has asked President Donald Trump to commute Lezmond Mitchell’s sentence on the grounds that his execution would violate Navajo culture and sovereignty, according to The Associated Press.

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Lezmond Mitchell was accused of killing a nine-year-old girl and her grandmother[/caption]

AP:Associated Press

Navajos have tried to stop Mitchell’s execution on the grounds that it would violate sovereignty[/caption]

Mitchell, 38, and an accomplice, Johnny Orsinger, were convicted of killing Tiffany Lee and her 63-year-old grandmother Alyce Slim after she had offered the pair a ride in her pickup truck as they were hitchhiking on Navajo territory in Arizona in 2001.

The two stabbed Slim 33 times, slit the child’s throat and then stoned her to death. They later mutilated the bodies.

Mitchell has long maintained that it was Orsinger who took the lead in killing little Tiffany and her grandmother.

Orsinger was a minor at the time of the attacks and could not be given the death penalty. He’s serving life in Atlanta.

AP:Associated Press

Family member Auska Mitchell holds a photo of the convicted killer[/caption]

The US Supreme Court ruled against stepping in to halt the execution late Tuesday, but Mitchell’s lawyers are still attempting to get a last minute intervention.

If the execution is carried out, the federal government under President Trump will have put more people to death in 2020 than the US government has in the past 56 years combined, according to the AP.

There are currently 58 men and one woman on federal death row. Many of those executions have been pending for decades, according to the New York Post.

Despite cultural objections from Navajos, Tiffany’s father Daniel Lee told the AP that he believes justice should be served on the “an eye for an eye” principle, and that the tribe’s leaders do not speak for him.

“I speak for myself and my daughter.”

Mitchell’s legal team has argued that since the Department of Justice set his execuation date on July 29, his petition to have his death sentence commuted in favor of a life sentence with no opportunity for parole has not been given enough time to be adequately considered, CNN reported.

However, with the execution scheduled for 6pm ET Wednesday, it’s not likely that the last ditch effort for clemency will be granted.