A 19-year-old American woman will be barred from seeing her father executed after a judge upheld a Missouri law saying she is too young.
Kevin Johnson faces execution Tuesday for killing a police officer in 2005 when he was 19.
He requested that his daughter, Khorry Ramey, attend.
The American Civil Liberties Union filed an emergency motion on her behalf, arguing that the state law violated her constitutional rights.
They said the age requirement in Missouri law, which prohibits anyone under the age of 21 from witnessing an execution, served no security purpose.
Johnson, 37, has been in prison since Ramey was two years old.
The couple bonded through visits, phone calls, letters, and emails. She took her newborn son to prison to meet his grandfather last month.
“I’m heartbroken that I won’t be able to be with my dad in his last moments,” Ramey said in a statement, adding that her father had worked hard to rehabilitate himself in prison and was praying that the governor of Missouri would grant him clemency, reports BBC.
Johnson was found guilty of the fatal shooting of Missouri police officer William McEntee, a father of three.
Johnson’s lawyers filed appeals seeking to save his life. While they do not dispute his guilt, they argue that racism played a role in the death sentence.
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