UK grants posthumous conditional pardon to Ruth Ellis, last woman executed
Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be hanged in the United Kingdom, received a posthumous conditional pardon following advice from Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy.
Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be hanged in the United Kingdom, was granted a posthumous conditional pardon. The pardon was issued following the advice of Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy.
His Majesty the King granted the conditional pardon, which does not declare Ellis innocent and replaces the death penalty with a sentence of life imprisonment (gdelt reported). Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy said the pardon will recognise a profound injustice in this exceptional case and will bring a measure of peace to Ruth Ellis’s family (gdelt reported).
Ellis was convicted of murder (miragenews.com reported) after shooting her partner David Blakely in 1955. She was hanged three months after the shooting (bluesky reported). In 1955 the judge told the jury to ignore that Ellis had been “badly treated by her lover” (bluesky reported).
The conditional pardon was granted in light of evidence that Ellis was a victim of domestic abuse and coercive and controlling behaviour.
According to miragenews.com, Ellis shot David Blakely on 10 April 1955.
This account was written only from facts that survived Augur's
corroboration pass — 6 corroborated across opposed news blocs,
0 contested (attributed to both sides), 9
single-source (attributed). Nothing was added; no significance was inferred.
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