1. Teresa Wilson Bean Lewis was an American murderer who was the only woman on death row in Virginia prior to her execution.
20 Facts About Teresa Lewis
1. 2.
Teresa Lewis was sentenced to death by lethal injection for the murders of her husband and stepson in October 2002.
3.
In September 2010, Teresa Lewis became the first female inmate to die by lethal injection in the state of Virginia.
4.
The couple had one daughter, Christie Lynn Bean, but the marriage soon ended in divorce, after which Teresa Lewis turned to alcohol and painkillers.
5.
Teresa Lewis was a recent widower with three children, Jason, Charles, and Kathy.
6.
In December 2001, Julian's older son, Jason Clifton Teresa Lewis, was killed in a car accident, leaving his father $200,000 from a life insurance policy.
7.
Teresa Lewis waited 45 minutes before calling for help, and while waiting for the police to arrive, she removed money from her dying husband's wallet.
8.
Teresa Lewis divided $300 with Shallenberger and Fuller before they left.
9.
Shortly after, Teresa Lewis was caught attempting to withdraw $50,000 from her dead husband's account with a forged check.
10.
Defense attorneys thought the evidence against Teresa Lewis was overwhelming and advised her to plead guilty to the capital charges in order to avoid a jury, and hope that the judge would show some leniency since Teresa Lewis had been cooperating with investigators.
11.
Teresa Lewis was placed on death row at the Fluvanna Correctional Center for Women in Troy, Virginia.
12.
Teresa Lewis's attorneys filed a petition for a writ of certiorari and an application for stay of execution with the US Supreme Court, but were denied on September 21,2010.
13.
Teresa Lewis addressed stepdaughter Kathy Teresa Lewis Clifton, who came to witness her execution, to apologize for killing her brother and father.
14.
Teresa Lewis spent her last hours praying and singing hymns.
15.
Teresa Lewis was executed on September 23,2010, at 9:13 pm by lethal injection, at Greensville Correctional Center near Jarratt.
16.
Teresa Lewis was the first woman to be executed in Virginia by lethal injection; no woman had been executed in the state since Virginia Christian, who died in the electric chair in 1912.
17.
Teresa Lewis was the first woman to be executed in the US since Frances Newton in 2005 by the State of Texas, and the second woman to be executed since serial killer Aileen Wuornos in 2002 by the State of Florida.
18.
Teresa Lewis's execution started a debate in the US and other parts of the world concerning capital punishment, and more specifically the application of death sentences on women in murder cases.
19.
Ken Cuccinelli, then the Attorney General of Virginia, had stated that "the brutal nature of the crimes themselves as well as Teresa Lewis' callous, manipulating, adulterous, greedy, egregious behavior" justified the death sentence.
20.
Teresa Lewis claimed the media's "heavy propaganda" campaign was perpetrating a double standard by not responding with similar outrage over Lewis's impending execution.