A non-Indian death row inmate who lost a last minute appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday has said his life should be spared because he grew up on the Navajo Nation.

Brett Hartman was sent to Window Rock, Arizona, as a child to live with his aunt. According to a Cleveland Scene article from 2009, he was the only non-Indian at his school and was teased by other kids in Navajo.

Hartman later moved to Ohio and was convicted of murdering a woman he knew in 1987. He said he didn't call police when he found her body because he grew up on the reservation, according to the Forgiveness Foundation.

In an appeal to the Supreme Court, Hartman's attorneys said his upbringing on the reservation was part of an “remarkably chaotic and nomadic early childhood."

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Ohio prepares to execute killer who stabbed woman, slit her throat, cut off her hands (AP 11/13)