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Victims & Offenders: An International
Journal of Evidence-based Research,
Policy, and Practice
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I Forgive You, but You Must Die: Murder
Victim Family Members, the Death
Penalty, and Restorative Justice
Leo G. Barrile
a
a
Bloomsburg University, Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania, USA
Published online: 26 Sep 2014.
To cite this article: Leo G. Barrile (2014): I Forgive You, but You Must Die: Murder Victim Family
Members, the Death Penalty, and Restorative Justice, Victims & Offenders: An International Journal of
Evidence-based Research, Policy, and Practice, DOI: 10.1080/15564886.2014.925022
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Victims and Offenders, 00:1–31, 2014
Copyright © Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
ISSN: 1556-4886 print/1556-4991 online
DOI: 10.1080/15564886.2014.925022
I Forgive You, but You Must Die:
Murder Victim Family
Members, the Death Penalty,
and Restorative Justice
Leo G. Barrile
Bloomsburg University, Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania, USA
Abstract: Previous studies have noted that in some capital cases, victim family members express forgiveness of the offender, empathy for his family, or for his adverse life
experiences—but still support the execution. This article attempts to explain the phenomenon by identifying three types of forgiveness and the motives for them, and it
explores the applicability of reparative dialogues between murder survivors and offenders. Empirical evidence comes from 52 interviews and/or open-ended questionnaires
with survivors whose capital cases ended in an execution in Texas or Virginia. Most
of the 52 survivors witnessed the execution, supported the death penalty, and rejected
remorse when it was expressed by the offender. Yet some of them forgave the offender,
empathized with the offender or his family, or were ambivalent about the death penalty,
despite supporting the execution—the “forgive but die” sentiment. This subset of survivors—forgivers and empathizers—who are the most amenable to mediation dialogues
are the focus of this study.
Keywords: murder victim survivors, murder co-victims, death penalty, capital
punishment, execution, mediation dialogue, restorative justice, closure, forgiveness,
empathy
INTRODUCTION
Previous research has documented that many murder victim family members in capital cases who forgave their loved one’s murderer still supported
The author would like to acknowledge Bloomsburg University for a grant that furnished research assistants to help with the data collection, and to Mary Katherine
Waibel-Duncan of Bloomsburg University and the anonymous reviewers and editor of
Victims and Offenders, whose poignant recommendations made the paper better, but
who certainly are not responsible for any of its shortcomings.
Address correspondence to Leo G. Barrile, Bloomsburg University, 2112 McCormick
Center, Bloomsburg, PA 17815. E-mail: lbarrile@bloomu.edu
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L. G. Barrile
his execution. The “forgive but die” sentiment persisted even after a reconciling mediation dialogue or expressions of remorse from the offender (Barrile,
2010a; Umbreit & Vos, 2000; Umbreit, Vos, Coates, & Martin, 2006). The sentiment’s dissonance—why survivors would say they forgive but grasp onto
the ultimately retributive punishment—has not been adequately addressed
by previous research. That is the task at hand.
This study explores the attitudes and sentiments of murder victim family
members (survivors) in Texas and Virginia, who have experienced the brutal murder of a loved one and endured a lengthy legal process—including the
offender’s execution, which most survivors attended. The study focuses on survivors who say they forgave the offender or who expressed empathy for him or
his family. Some of these survivors had contact with the offender prior to the
execution. Using the concept of “accounts” (Armour, 2003; Armour & Umbreit,
2012; Scott & Lyman, 1968; Tilly, 2006) the author analyzes interviews and
open-ended questionnaires of survivors who tell their story—their personal
and social accounts of the crime, the criminal, and the punishment. Survivors
shared their sentiments, attitudes, and explanations, which were sometimes
complex and contradictory, but which served to restore control or order to their
tragically interrupted lives. In their narratives, forgiveness and empathy were
usually fused with either resolute or equivocal support for the death penalty.
In only one case did a forgiver reject the execution and support mercy for the
offender, a forgive-and-live rather than a forgive-but-die sentiment. That led
the author to postulate three types of forgiveness (restrictive, ambivalent, and
redemptive); to discover the motives for each type; and to explore the role that
reparative communication can play for all types of forgivers and empathizers.
Survivors’ Support for the Death Penalty
For survivors, justice, vindication for the victim, relief from the judicial process, and reduction of fear of the offender (particularly that he will kill again)
are factors that buoy support for the execution (Amick-McMullan, Kilpatrick,
& Resnick, 1991; Barrile, 2010b; Gross & Matheson, 2003; Madeira, 2010).
Many survivors feel emotionally relieved when the execution is over (Gross &
Matheson, 2003). Seeking to dissipate chronic grief is also a factor bolstering
support for the death penalty, regardless of the improbability of that outcome
(Amick-McMullan et al., 1991).
Support for the execution offers a degree of personal control or agency in
survivors, who have been emotionally shredded by the crime and unwillingly
linked to the offender. This phenomenon is referred to variously as judicial closure (Armour & Umbreit, 2007), relief and victim vindication (Barrile, Slone, &
Larned, 2008; Gross & Matheson, 2003; Slone & Barrile, 2007), a conclusion of
one process and the opening of another (Madeira, 2010), and personal control
(Armour & Umbreit, 2012).
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Murder Victim Family Members
Galan and Guerra (cited in Armour & Umbreit, 2007, pp. 411–412) found
in 41 interviews of Texas survivors in 1999 that post-traumatic stress disorder
(PTSD) symptoms declined from 44% to 19.5% after survivors witnessed the
execution, and none of them said they regretted attending. Similarly, Gross
and Matheson (2003), using 138 postexecution media interviews in Texas
from 1999 to 2002, found that relief was one of the most common themes
expressed by survivors, who said they experienced a “conclusion,” an “end point
in a long painful process” (p. 515). Slone and Barrile (2007), in a sample of
170 news interviews in Texas from 1996 to 2006, found that 50% of the survivors expressed closure or relief while 18% expressed forgiveness or empathy.
And Madeira (2010), in 27 interviews of Oklahoma City bombing victims and
their families, found that respondents generally loathed the word “closure” but
accepted the role that the trial, testimony, and execution played in seeking vindication for the victims. Survivors who attended the execution felt that justice
was done and the process was completed.
Life without parole also contributes to a sense of personal control—perhaps
sooner than capital punishment because the main legal chapter has been
closed and the “involuntary relationship” between the offender and the survivor is not prolonged by the often-lengthy appeals process in capital cases
(Armour & Umbreit, 2012). It is the legal limbo of the capital appeals process that elicits survivor frustration with the criminal justice system and
leads to additional emotional distress, delaying the bereavement process—the
survivor’s expression of and dealing with grief (Amick-McMullan, Kilpatrick,
Veronen, & Smith, 1989). However the interlude after sentencing and before
execution creates an opportunity for a reconciling dialogue with the offender
(Szmania & Mangis, 2005).
Survivors and Reparative Communication
Regardless of the form of ultimate punishment, execution or life without
parole, survivors voice a desire to know more, to know why. An integral part
of a victim’s narrative is reason-giving (Tilly, 2006), a way to make sense of
what is a seemingly senseless, random, pathological act that destroys one’s
sense of a just world (Fox, Von Bargen, & Jester, 1996; Janoff-Bulman & Frieze,
1983). Communication between the survivor and the offender can render vital,
sought-after information that can be used for reason-giving and meaningmaking, and perhaps bring partial emotional relief. There are several venues
that make that possible, with varying degrees of effectiveness.
Creating communicative environments for survivors and offenders is a first
step in a restorative justice process. Szmania and Mangis (2005) find that an
ideal period for an apology from the offender is after sentencing, when it is less
likely to be perceived as politicking for a lighter punishment. Communication
can be formal, as in an institutionally sponsored victim/offender mediation
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L. G. Barrile
dialogue (VOMD) at the prison. It can be a remorseful declaration from the
offender during a last statement at the execution. Or it can be a conference
organized by the offender’s attorney, a defense initiated victim outreach (DIVO;
see Madeira, 2010). Communication can also be informal and unsupervised, as
in letters, e-mails, telephone calls, impromptu visits or meetings allowed by
the courts or prisons, and even in newspaper op-ed pieces (Szmania & Mangis,
2005).
In capital cases, one of the most common types of communication—albeit
restricted, brief, and one-way—is the last statement. In Texas apologetic last
statements doubled from 19% to 40% after the victim’s survivors were allowed
to witness executions (Slone & Barrile, 2007). Last words are part of the iconic
execution “frame” (Goffman, 1974), a closely constructed social ritual. Gross
and Matheson (2003) describe the “hallmark execution,” in which the offender
expresses deep remorse to the victim’s family, which is moved to forgive the
offender, who then feels at peace with himself and (if religious) with his maker
before he is executed. The hallmark execution is redemptive and reparative.
In real executions, the majority of offenders do not apologize at their execution
and if they do the majority of survivors do not accept the apology, seeing it
as self-serving, insincere, or inadequate (Barrile, 2010b; Gross & Matheson,
2003). While hallmark executions are uncommon, forgivers and empathizers
are more likely to accept a remorseful last statement as genuine, expressing
empathy toward the offender or his family, and sometimes ambivalence about
the death penalty (Barrile, 2010b).
One of the most reparative communications is the dialogue between the
offender and a victim family member, but it is quite rare in capital cases. Texas
has allowed only a handful of formal dialogues in its history in these cases,
though unofficial or informal communication has occurred at prisons, in courts,
over the telephone, in letters, and through third parties.
Face-to-face dialogues offer the greatest opportunity for restorative justice,
and for bridging the “us/them” gulf (Tilly, 2008). Survivors have a chance to
confront offenders directly with their grief and anger. They have the opportunity to discover the offender’s motives and the specifics of the situation on the
fateful day of the crime. Survivors typically want to know as much as they can,
particularly what their loved one last experienced and said. Offenders have
the opportunity to hear survivors tell them about the collateral consequences
of the crime, to take responsibility, to show regret and sadness, and to express
remorse. These interactions change the premise of the normal, anonymous,
antagonistic relationship between offenders and survivors and give survivors
a chance to gauge the genuineness of the offender’s apology. Grief does not disappear. But the consuming hatred of the offender has a chance to subside. Both
the survivor and the offender express feelings of relief and healing. VOMDs
are found to be therapeutic, yet the empathy generated in the survivors for
Murder Victim Family Members
the offender did not abate their desire for the execution (Umbreit & Vos, 2000;
Umbreit et al., 2006).
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Survivors and Forgiveness
Survivors who are forgivers and empathizers are more likely to understand the emotional pain of the offender’s family and they can be moved by
an offender’s expression of remorse—unlike most survivors, who reject such
expressions as self-serving, inadequate, or irrelevant (Barrile, 2010b).
Needless to say, forgiveness does not always indicate mercifulness.
Researchers have described variations in forgiveness, such as hollow and
true (that is superficially external versus genuinely internal) (Baumeister,
Exline, & Sommer, 1998); relationship or other-oriented versus self-oriented
(Strelan, Feather & McKee, 2011; Takada & Ohbuchi, 2013; Wenzel &
Okimoto, 2012), and socially obliged self-presentation (Enright, Santos, &
Al-Mabuk, 1989; McCullough & Worthington, 1994) versus stress reduction
(McCullough, Pargament, & Thoresen, 2000). Typical of these studies, Takada
and Ohbuchi (2013) find that “true” forgiveness is relationship-oriented and is
more amenable to collaborative conflict resolution than is “hollow” forgiveness,
which they describe as self-oriented.
These forgiveness dichotomies are rigidly categorical and do not adequately capture the complexity of feelings in capital cases where memories of
a brutal killing, chronic grief, a desire for justice, and fears and concerns about
the offender swirl together with cultural expectations, religious precepts, psychological needs, and core values. Survivor forgiveness does not stop short of
mercy because it is hollow, but because forgivers are pulled in many directions
emotionally and socially. They forgive, but often believe that the punishment
is justice for the victim or protection for the community.
In this paper the author focuses on forgivers and empathizers, particularly the three types of forgivers postulated (restrictive, ambivalent, and
redemptive), the motives for each type, and the circumstances in which
reparative dialogues can most appropriately be implemented.
METHOD
This is a qualitative study based upon 52 open-ended questionnaires and
38 telephone interviews of close family members of murder victims (23 males,
29 females) whose offenders were executed in Texas or Virginia (mostly Texas).
These two states performed nearly one-half (46%) of the 1,338 executions in the
country since 1976, with Texas itself executing 37% of the U.S. total (Death
Penalty Information Center, 2013). Most of the respondents witnessed the
execution. Those identified as forgivers and empathizers are a subset of this
sample. Fortuitously, the sample included a few survivors who had contact
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L. G. Barrile
with the offender—three had face-to-face meetings with the offender, one a
telephone conservation, and three received letters. The sample was selected by
searching several public access websites from 2007 to 2012. The attempt was
to obtain a list of survivors whose offenders had been executed. Details of capital murders, offenders, victims, and executions were available on the Texas
Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) website (2014) and the Clark County
Prosecutor’s Office (CCPO) website (2014). Both sources maintain updated
databases on executed offenders, which list the following: the offender’s name,
age, race; the dates of the crime; education, occupation, and last statement;
and the victim’s age, race, and location. The CCPO also contains statements of
survivors and others—such as prosecutors, politicians, celebrities, and interest groups—and information about survivors present at the execution (such as
their city of residence) along with news articles and detailed legal decisions
regarding the case. Other news sources and Internet sites were also mined
for information about survivors’ names and cities of residence1 . The effort produced a convenience sample of 52 respondents who completed questionnaires
and respondents who consented to semistructured interviews. A preliminary
questionnaire (17 items) was developed and mailed to potential survivors with
an introductory letter and a request for an interview, which consisted of a
set of open-ended questions on several topics that was developed as a guideline. Topics included sentiments about the victim, the crime, the offender, the
offender’s family, their own family and friends, their community, organizations,
the media, the criminal justice system, the death penalty, the last statement (if
any), the execution experience, communication (if any) with the offender, and
the survivor’s social and psychological adjustment. Respondents were encouraged to talk freely about their feelings and attitudes. The attempt was to make
interviews more like conversations. Interviews ranged from one to three hours
and were recorded and transcribed. In some cases there were subsequent telephone conversations, e-mails, and letters. Cases were analyzed to detect main
themes that developed in each survivor’s interview, and comparisons were
made to find patterns among interviews. The goal was to discover how survivors made sense of the crime and punishment and to generate concepts that
best explained their sentiments and experience.
Of the 52 murder victim family members, the main part of this article is
restricted to 8 of the respondents, 6 of whom were identified mainly as forgivers
(4 females and 2 males) and 2 of whom were identified mainly as empathizers
(both males).
As to communications with the offender, nearly one-half of the survivors
heard an apology from the offender at the execution or in a communication or
written statement. Of survivors, 3 (unrelated to the offender) had face-to-face
meetings with him prior to the execution, 1 survivor had a telephone conversation, and 3 received letters. One meeting was an officially sanctioned VOMD
sponsored by the TDCJ Victim Services Division, one was a DIVO, and one
Murder Victim Family Members
was an informal dialogue arranged by a correctional administrator at TDCJ
the day of the execution at the cell-front of the offender with a survivor.
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FINDINGS
The challenge in qualitative research is to do justice to the people one is interviewing, and to guard against influencing their responses by overly directing
the questions toward preconceived concepts or themes. That said, the previous
research did render ideas about the kinds of responses that might emerge in
the questionnaires and interviews of the survivors. Still, the strategy was to
let the richness of responses lead as much as possible to subsequent questions.
As interviews progressed, it became apparent that survivor feelings were
not only diverse and varied among individuals but also within individuals who expressed seemingly contradictory sentiments, such as empathy yet
demonization, forgiveness yet a desire for the execution. The paradox might
be attributed to “emotional anomie”—the simultaneity of opposing emotions
(Karp, 2001; Lauritzen, 1992). But if emotions are inherently nonrational why
would they ever be normative or ordered? Societies do their best to bind emotions to external rules and norms that create an “appropriate” emotion for an
“appropriate” situation. The “emotion rules” are socially constructed and do
have an effect on an individual’s personal constructs of emotions. Too much
unpredictability in a person’s expression of emotions and one might be considered troubled, sick, insane, or malingering (Karp, 2001). Individuals dealing
with persistent grief from a homicide loss are more likely to have a welter
of conflicting emotions about the death penalty and deviate from the emotion
rules. Survivors may have no explanation for why they feel simultaneously
vengeful and empathetic toward the offender or why they feel sadness, satisfaction, emptiness, and even humor at the execution. It is glib to say that
they are all “coping” mechanisms, because survivors sometimes cope by suppressing these feelings and living life as practically as they can. Whether it is
emotional anomie or simply emotional complexity, it is not amenable to purely
rational social rules. Individual survivors expressed their own constellation of
emotions, which varied noticeably among them.
The Forgiveness/Vengeance Continuum
A typology of ten main sentiments regarding the offender and the death
penalty were drawn from the responses of the survivors. They can be placed
on a continuum from forgiveness to vengeance. They are forgiveness, empathy, accepting remorse, ambivalence, allayment of fear, relief, justice, rejecting
remorse, demonization, and vengeance. Following are brief sketches of these
sentiments.
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L. G. Barrile
1. Forgiveness (restrictive—personal or ideological, supports execution;
ambivalent—unsure about execution, but supports it in this case;
redemptive—altruistic, rejects execution)
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2. Empathy (sympathy for offender or his family, externalize blame for crime)
3. Accept Remorse (accepts an offender’s apology as sincere, genuine, conciliatory)
4. Ambivalence (dubious about or rejects the death penalty, considers life
without parole)
5. Allayment of Fear or Concern (concern that offender will harm others
again)
6. Relief (judicial, emotional, psychological closure, completion of a process,
personal control)
7. Justice (death penalty is deserved for the harm caused, it is validation of
the victim)
8. Reject Remorse (perceives offender apology as insincere, insignificant,
irrelevant)
9. Demonization (individualized theory of crime, criminal as pathological,
evil, monster)
10. Vengeance (revenge, persistent hatred, lethal injection is too painless a
death)
Most of the survivors see the death penalty as just, deserving, and warranted for the murder. The most common sentiment expressed by survivors is
justice (85% of the survivors). The punishment is seen as fitting the severity
of the crime and as validating the suffering and loss of the victim. Many said
that they attended the execution for the sake of their loved one. The death
penalty, the most extreme sentence one can pay, symbolized for them the public recognition that the victim’s life was valuable and that the retribution, the
offender’s life, is the legitimate proof of it.
In a similar vein, over one half (58%) of the survivors said they felt relief
or closure from the execution and nearly one half (48%) felt the execution
reduced their fears and anxiety about the offender escaping or being released
to harm them or others. A little more than one third (35%) of the survivors
express vengeance as a reason for favoring the death penalty and about the
same proportion (37%) demonize the offender, describing him as evil or pathological. Similarly harsh on the offender, nearly one third blame the offender’s
family for his criminality. Tellingly, over three-fourths of the survivors reject
remorse when it is offered by the offender (one half of the offenders expressed
remorse).
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Murder Victim Family Members
By contrast, restoratively oriented sentiments are less often expressed by
the survivors. Forgiveness occurs in only 15% of the survivors, empathy in 12%,
sympathy for the offender’s family in 25%, and only 23% accept the offender’s
remorse when it is offered. Similarly, only one fourth of the survivors express
ambivalence about the death penalty.
The main themes are more fluid than exclusive. For instance, while there
were survivors who certainly expressed vengeance and others empathy, it
would be misleading to say that they could easily be categorized into one
type of survivor. For instance, forgivers in this sample nearly always supported the execution to allay their fears that the offender would somehow be
released and kill again or simply that it was justice served. And some justiceseekers expressed empathy for the offender’s tragic life or ambivalence about
the usefulness of the death penalty compared to life without parole.
While sentiments are often portrayed in rhetoric as static, most of the survivors in this sample seriously considered the fairness and proportionality of
the execution for the offender and for their loved ones. While the overwhelming majority believed the execution to be just and said they supported it before
the execution, after the execution a few thought it was not painful enough,
that the offender did not suffer as much as the victim. Others thought that
perhaps life in solitary confinement might have been more painful and thus
more proportional to the harm experienced by the victim, though most survivors stated that it would be a waste of taxpayer dollars to keep a murderer
alive for decades. A minority were ambivalent, indifferent, or even repulsed
by the execution. And nearly all survivors pointed out that the execution had
little or no effect on their grief—relief, but not a reduction of grief.
The best chance that restorative justice has to be implemented in capital cases is by focusing on survivor sentiments that are situated on the less
retributive side of the continuum. The most promising, of course, are those
survivors who say they have forgiven the offender or are empathetic with the
offender’s plight. Even here there is complexity. As stated above, forgiveness
does not always indicate a willingness to cancel the debt. Forgiveness is often
expressed for personal reasons, such as dissipating the debilitating anger and
homicidal fantasies, or for religious reasons, to comply with the principles or
doctrines of one’s faith. Similarly, empathy is often restricted to understanding a person’s circumstances rather than sympathizing with their pleas for
mercy. Given these provisos, the following section explores the possibilities for
restorative justice among 8 survivors survivors who expressed the greatest
degree of forgiveness or empathy expressed in their narratives.
Forgiveness
Forgiveness has two meanings. One is to renounce resentment or hatred
of the offender; the other is to excuse or pardon the person for the offense
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L. G. Barrile
(American Heritage Dictionary, 1992, p. 713). The first definition indicates a
circumscribed forgiveness, one that stops short of excusing the behavior; the
second is an unrestricted forgiveness that includes mercy and pardoning.
The forgivers in this research can be delineated as well. There are restrictive forgivers, redemptive forgivers, and (those falling in between) ambivalent
forgivers. Restrictive forgivers renounce their hatred of the offender. Some
of them want to meet with the offender, and they accept remorseful expressions of the offender. Nevertheless, they want the death penalty to proceed.
In this study there were two main sources of restrictive forgiveness, personal
or psychological and ideological or religious. The former is based on a desire to
save one’s sanity from the grip of hatred by relinquishing anger, resentment,
vengefulness, and murder fantasies that consume one’s thoughts and feelings.
Restrictive forgivers seek to shed the obsessive ruminations about the offender
and the crime and the aggravating attachment of the offender to the memory of their loved one—a persistent involuntary relationship. Survivors, while
undergoing counseling, may have been advised to abandon anger. In contrast,
ideological or religious sources of forgiveness are based upon norms, values,
or beliefs and in this sample are typically religious in nature. The survivors
relinquish anger and resentment not only for psychological sanity, but also to
comply with their religious or political beliefs—particularly, in this sample, the
Christian directive to forgive one’s enemies, to hate the sin not the sinner, and
to cleanse one’s soul of vengeful desires. However, restrictive forgivers stop
short of restraining their support of the death penalty, and in some cases will
reference the older religious mandate for capital punishment.
By contrast, redemptive forgivers not only relinquish hatred and
vengeance, but also are amenable to sparing the offender’s life—to reducing
his sentence to life in prison and to helping the person become civil. They are
typically against the death penalty, and believe it is inhumane. They would
support commutation to a life sentence for the murderer.
Ambivalent forgivers are unsure about the appropriateness of the death
penalty for their loved one’s murderer, and passively support it—especially
if other family members strongly advocate for it. Forgiveness occurred in
8 respondents, 5 of whom were restrictive, 2 ambivalent, and 1 redemptive.
Fortuitously for this study 2 of the forgivers had face-to-face dialogues with
the offenders and 1 received a long letter from the offender, which appears to
have elicited her forgiveness.
Restrictive Forgiveness
In the context of this study restrictive forgiving is performed for personal
or psychological reasons or to conform to obligatory religious or cultural precepts. Restrictive forgivers struggle to renounce obsessive feelings of hatred,
resentment, anger, and revenge, which they see as destroying their psyche
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Murder Victim Family Members
or soul. Some may use their religion, spiritual advisors, or psychological
counselors to arrive at this conclusion, while others do so on their own.
Restrictive forgivers seek peace of mind and dissolution of the offender’s connection to their lives and to the memory of their loved ones. Their forgiveness
dissipates hatred and rumination, but they do not pardon the offender and the
debt they believe he owes to the victim and society. They believe that the death
penalty is appropriate for the savagery of the crime, given the existing laws.
Case 15 is a good example of a restrictive forgiver. She compartmentalizes
forgiveness and justice. Case 15 had two officially sponsored mediation dialogues with her son’s murderer and his female accomplice. Case 15 believed
that her religious faith guided her to forgive, and that she needed to tell the
offender in person that she had forgiven him. Case 15 now speaks publicly
about her case, particularly to religious groups. Case 15 was touched by how
remorseful the killer was and that he had a religious epiphany in prison and
became a devout Christian. She was equally unimpressed with the tepid apology and multiple excuses she received from the female accomplice, who blamed
her own family for all of her problems and pitied herself more than the victim
and his family.
Upon Case 15’s request and the subsequent agreement of the male
offender, the TDCJ Victim Services Division arranged a mediation dialogue.
The dialogue took place in a visiting room at the prison with a window separating the participants. Notice how her religious beliefs form the foundation
for her forgiveness:
Why did you want to meet with the offender?
I did it because my contact with him, it was several years after he murdered my
son. My son was murdered in ’87 and I did not meet with him until 1999. So that
was 12 years. But during those 12 years I had had some counseling, and I really
struggled to do what God wanted me to do. And He made it very clear that I needed
to forgive him. And once I did, I felt like I just had to go and tell him that I’d
forgiven him. And that was my reason for mediation. And when I told the Texas
Department of Criminal Justice about that, they were more than happy to make
way for my mediation.
Note that Case 15 also cites personal or psychological reasons for forgiving, as
in the following passage:
Did you have anger at this guy? Did you want revenge at first?
Yes, at first I did have revenge for him. And after, um, after, um counseling, and
after studying over this for some years. It took about three years for me to really
come to grips with this. And I’ve understood that I could not have bitterness and
vengeance and hatred. I understood that. That, I mean, I know that when a person
is bitter and has hate in their heart, that they cannot live a quality life. Um, they’re
going to carry that with them and it’s going to make an old person out of them
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really fast. And they’re going to be grumpy and unhappy and not have any friends.
I want quality of life. I don’t want that.
That was one thing that really drove me to decide that I would forgive him. And
the forgiveness came as a willingness, and it’s very hard for people who have not
been through it to understand, I’m sure. But if a person is willing, and in my case
I was willing, and God just took it from there. I could say I wanted to forgive, and
He just took it from there.
Note her desire to punish is straightforward, existing alongside her forgiveness:
When you requested a mediation dialogue, did the TDCJ ask you if you were going
to back up his appeals or requests for clemency?
Oh no. No. No. They understood my feeling. I wanted the execution to take
place because, um, he, he, because it was justified. [author’s emphasis] I felt
like, that for the sake of society that the execution should take place. Ah, he did the
crime and he should accept the execution, which he did. No I did not, have any,
any, problem with the execution.
She tells the murderer that she has forgiven him, but also wants the death
penalty to be carried out:
There was a point about halfway through the mediation where I got angry and
screamed at him and told him what a bad person he was. And, ah, just got it
all out. And then things settled down. We took a break and things settled down.
And we came back. And things ended on a good note. And I told him that I
had forgiven him. And I hoped he had prepared himself for the kingdom of God,
because God can forgive him too. And I hoped that he could accept that forgiveness,
because I did not want him to burn in hell. I wanted him to be taken out
of this society. [author’s emphasis]
She establishes another reason for supporting his execution besides the fact
that in her mind it is justified—namely, that he is still a dangerous felon who
would kill again. She demonizes him as a chronic murderer and, to her, his
track record confirmed that view:
I just asked him, if by some chance, some fluke, if he was set free, did he think he
might kill another person? And his answer, after he thought about it for a minute,
his answer was yes. And that is my reason. [her emphasis] People like that
need to be taken out of society. And we can’t, we can’t continue to house
and feed these criminals. [author’s emphasis] And it costs a ton of money to put
them in incarceration. And I just think if they’re not going to get any better, which
obviously they’re not. They’re turned loose every day. And within months they’re
incarcerated again. So it appears to me that something’s not right here. And that
feeling along with the fact that he had a choice. My son was the second person that
he had ever killed.
Murder Victim Family Members
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Restrictive forgivers do not pardon the offender nor excuse the debt, and might
not support a substitute punishment such as life without parole. Restrictive
forgivers have elements of justice seekers. They see capital punishment as
appropriate for the crime. Some restrictive forgivers have more compassion for
offenders who are expressively remorseful. Notice how Case 15 differentially
assesses the apologies from the female codefendant and the murderer:
And how did your mediation with her go?
It went okay. I had let go of it. I had forgiven her, but um, um, she’s not as remorseful as he was. I mean he was remorseful. . . . And she, she’s just not as remorseful
as he was.
She never apologized? Or did she apologize?
Well, she did a little. I can’t remember the exact words. She acted somewhat
remorseful, I guess, but the thing is with her I felt like it was an act. But with
him I felt that he was pouring his heart out. I really did
Did she say, well I didn’t think it was going to wind up that way? Did she make
some excuses?
Oh yeah. Uh huh. She did. And she gave me all kinds of excuses about how she
was brought up, her mother gave her away when she was just a baby, and her
grandmother tried to raise her and it was, oh, I don’t know, it was a horrible mess.
It was just a, it was, she just wasn’t accountable. She wasn’t accountable. And he
was. He was. You know, he cried, he, ah, telling me how sorry he was.
Case 15 believed she could distinguish genuine remorse from an artificial apology, and it was certainly more fulfilling for her to meet with her son’s murderer
than the female accomplice. But as therapeutic as it was, her desire for the
execution as justice for her son, combined with the offender’s admission that
he would kill again, prevented any inkling in her to support mercy or a commutation of his sentence. An unrepentant offender makes mercy even more
remote. Notwithstanding their forgiving sentiment, survivors facing offenders who denied committing the crime, despite overwhelming evidence to the
contrary, might not be as amenable to mediation dialogues as with a contrite
offender.
Case 36 represents forgiveness despite the remorselessness of her mother’s
murderer. She states clearly that she forgave the murderer, largely because
of her religious beliefs, and like Case 15 she wanted the offender to die. But
the offender never apologized, never displayed a semblance of remorse, and
Case 36 had no desire to communicate with him in any way. She did not want
him to take any satisfaction in affecting her life.
Do you think if he had apologized, that it would have made a difference to you?
Yeah, I think it would. I do. Um, I’m not sure I could say what kind of difference.
Yeah, I mean showing remorse for killing somebody is kind of a human thing to
do. The fact that he never did apologize, yeah, that was pretty brutal.
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If he had made an impassioned apology would you have forgiven him sooner or
not?
Ah, no. No, I don’t think so. Um, I guess it is really hard to say, because he would
have been, it would have been like he was an entirely different person, because
everything would have had to be different for that to happen. I don’t think so.
It was what it was. It happened. And even if he was sorry, he still did it. It would
have made a small difference, but not a huge difference.
Did you have any interest in doing a mediation dialogue with him?
No, I didn’t want anything to do with him. I think part of it was maybe an issue of,
as I think about it, just the word pride comes to mind. I’m not sure you understand
that, but I didn’t want anything to do with him. You know, I was, probably, I didn’t
want to look at him. I just didn’t. So, I can’t imagine. If I said anything to him, I’m
afraid that if I opened my mouth I wouldn’t have stopped. You know it wouldn’t
have been pretty. And so, you know, a lot of reasons not just, not just pride. You
know, like I said before, I did not want him to know how much he had hurt me.
You know, I didn’t want to admit, I didn’t want to give him that power, I guess,
that he had rocked my world and all of that, you know.
Though the offender showed no remorse, Case 36 was not as opposed
to life without parole as an optional sentence as was Case 15. However,
Case 36 expressed the feeling that before he was executed, she thought the
death penalty would be a relief, and after it was done, it was.
I wanted it to be over, but I didn’t necessarily want to see someone die. You know, I
wanted him dead but I didn’t want to watch. . . . And, you know, having become a
Christian in the middle of the process, I was trying to have somewhat of a forgiving
and grace filled attitude, of you know, not wanting to have revenge. I just wanted
the justice system to do its job, what’s going to happen is fine. I was trying not to
be greedy for revenge or bloodthirsty, you know, vengeance.
What was in your heart about the death penalty?
I had no problem with him being put to death. I was trying not to wish for it.
I think. You know, I was trying not to, really long for it because the cards had
already been committed. And honestly you know I wasn’t really sure if it would
matter one way or the other if he was in prison for his whole life or if he was
put to death. You know I wanted him to get justice, or at least not be on the streets
certainly. I know there was a part of me that probably wanted him to die. I’m really
not so sure that it wasn’t because I knew then it would be over for sure. Because,
it seems like otherwise you never know for sure if they’re going to get out, even
though they think they’re not. You know they get paroled. So I think that’s the only
way I knew for sure that it was really over. If he had been put in prison for life
without parole, as long as it was what they said it was, it probably would have
been okay. But I certainly didn’t think, gee, oh please, spare him his life. There’s
definitely a streak in there that said, he took her life, and I have no problem with
him dying.
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Murder Victim Family Members
What was your reaction to the execution that day?
It’s hard to separate the fact that it was over. That was the relief that it was over.
Ninety percent of it was that. I knew I wasn’t going to be seeing it on the evening
news again. You know it was a relief, knowing he was gone, was a relief. It was
hard to measure what was more relieving. . . . It wasn’t closure. That takes a lot
more personal working through for closure, but the relief in the end, at least the
end of that ordeal, I would say definitely is what happened that day.
Case 36 clearly did not require an apology to forgive. Her religious belief
propelled her. Not so for Case 46, whose adult daughter was murdered. She
forgave only after she received a long letter from the offender, who expressed
his transformation as a Christian and his sorrow for the murder. He asked for
her forgiveness. Notice that Case 46’s forgiveness helps her to dissipate her
hatred for the offender:
He wrote me a letter. He gave it to his lawyer and through the pastor of the church
that I had just attended. I didn’t want to open it, but I did. He said he had a bad
life, that he didn’t know [my daughter] had a child, and that he was abandoned
as a child. He apologized. I felt that “I’m sorry” wasn’t enough. At the bottom of the
letter he asked me to forgive him. I had to do that, for my sake not his.
I did not want to carry this hatred on for the rest of my life. . . . My love for her
was greater than my hatred for him. He would be gone and my daughter would be
there the rest of my life.
I believe he had true remorse. He said something in his letter about his first few
years in prison. He was cocky about it. Then a Christian group made him see what
he did. After that he spent a lot of time thinking what he did.
And while Case 46 forgives to heal herself psychologically, it was the execution, apparently, that facilitated the disengagement of the offender from her
memories of her daughter.
The execution solved nothing in reality, but it did bring closure or an ending to
that situation. I felt that . . . the victim, had gotten justice. And that I could have
the memories of her life back without always thinking of her as a victim. It put
the period on the issue. [author’s emphasis]
Restrictive forgivers have many reasons to steer clear of showing mercy or supporting an alternative to the death sentence. Some refer to the offender’s future
dangerousness and apprehension about a possible release. Others mention the
desires of other family members. Many voice a yearning to see justice done,
which is a thin thread from resentment and revenge, the very contradictions
of forgiveness.
One might conclude that these forgivers are mixing retribution with forgiveness and that they are deluding themselves about relinquishing their
feelings of resentment. But their support for the death penalty is often based
upon concerns or fears that the offender might maneuver a release and
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L. G. Barrile
continue to be a danger to society or even to the survivor. In other cases, conflicting feelings are related to the politics of the family, and the need to keep
peace within it. These factors were evident in the following cases of ambivalent forgivers. They did not necessarily desire the death penalty but had major
concerns impinging on their decision making. Supporting the death penalty
might have been the way to avoid familial rejection or criticism and perhaps
stigmatization as weak on a crime against a family member.
Ambivalent Forgiveness
Ambivalent forgivers are unsure of the death penalty—that is, whether
to support it or not for their loved one’s murderer, but they fall just short of
the redemptive forgiver who rejects the death penalty outright and supports
a life sentence. There are two ambivalent forgivers in the sample. One who
met directly with the offender, and one who did not. Both knew the offenders
beforehand.
Case 19 considered supporting a commutation of the death sentence of her
mother’s murderer, but two issues blocked it. The first was the fear that the
inmate, who purportedly was not taking his medications, would be released
and repeat his crimes. At the time she was considering the issue, Texas did
not have a life without parole sentence available for the defendant. The second
reason was her family. She did not want to fight a battle against her brothers
and sisters, who, she believed, desired the execution. It turned out that she
was not the only family member who was ambivalent about the death penalty.
Toward the end of the appeals process in this case, the offender and his
lawyer implored officials to set up a meeting with a family member in an effort
to obtain support for a last-minute sentence commutation. On the day of the
execution, the chairman of the Texas Board of Criminal Justice was present
and asked the family if someone would be willing to talk to the offender.
Case 19 volunteered. She was escorted to the Ellis Unit cell block where the
offender was held awaiting the execution. She was seated outside of his cell and
the chairman was seated nearby, down the hallway. Case 19 was able to talk
with the offender through the cell door. Notice that she offers forgiveness to the
offender from herself and on behalf of her mother, but believes she must reject
his plea to support mercy because she has real concerns about his future dangerousness, and she does not want to contradict her siblings’ collective opinion,
which she believes to be firmly supportive of the death penalty.
What was your conversation with him?
Well I haven’t told many people. And I wrote down what I said, but I haven’t looked
at it in a while recently.
When I walked in, I said, Hi [offender’s name]. And he said, I don’t know you.
And I said, no, you don’t. We’ve never met. And he goes, and the light went on in
his little head. You could see that, and he was drugged. They may deny it, but he
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Murder Victim Family Members
was. And he said, ohhhh, that’s why I could never figure it out. I never knew you.
I said, you never knew me because I wasn’t ever in the house [while you were there].
And so, apparently this had been something that was bothering him. His lawyer
told me that afterwards, because I talked to his lawyer afterwards. That had been
bothering him a lot. About who I was, how I played in it, and why he could never
remember me. And my sister and I look a lot alike [her younger sister knew the
offender]. . . . So it seems like that was foggy in his mind. And the light went on
when he saw me . . .
So then he said he was sorry and he didn’t want to die. And um, when he said
he was sorry, um, I told him I forgive you. [long pause, choking up] And I told him
I was wearing my mother’s wedding ring, and this is her ring, and she forgives
you. And then I put my hand through the lunch tray area, or, I can’t remember I
think he reached out and I put my hand through, and um I just held his hand,
and he said, I don’t want to die. And I said, I can’t help you. And I think at that
time I got pretty, I think I realized that I was getting too emotionally upset, this
was not going to do him any good. And I said, I gotta go. I mean, [chuckle] I heard
that Bill Cosby or something about exit lines, I gotta go. I remember that at the
time. Probably not the best one at the time.
Case 19 had an existential dilemma near the execution. A last ditch effort
was made for commutation of the offender’s sentence and support from the
victim’s family might have been instrumental in securing it. The family was
contacted at the eleventh hour by the Board of Pardons and Parole and, as
spokesperson for her family, Case 19 struggled to make what turned out to be
a fateful decision:
Towards the end, one of the appellate lawyers tried to call and talk to me.
Did they think if you spoke in behalf of the offender articulately that it would
have any bearing on the sentence or appeals?
Oh absolutely. And so do I. And the reason I think that is that I got a call at 7 in the
morning from the Board of Pardons and Parole asking me that day. Because they
sent letters out to us and I responded. Maybe because mine was, I don’t know, a
little heavy, that I responded to the letter. Anyway I talked to that lawyer that night
and he said, he wants to talk to one of you all, he wants to talk to a family member.
And I said okay, that packed a wallop. And I was cordial to the lawyer and I said
. . . I don’t do criminal law, but tell me, if his sentence is commuted when will he
get out, because he already had 20 years in prison. He said very shortly. So really
a life sentence in Texas is really 20 years. . . . And so I said to him he’s got all
that good time in 20 years, so when will he be out? He said, pretty soon. So I said
the problem is, my understanding is that he doesn’t take his meds. He said, that’s
right. That’s been his problem all along on death row, he hasn’t taken his meds.
I said, well, then how could you want him out if you know he’s not going to take
his meds? And he might do this again. I mean, he’s healthy right? He’s 38. I might
be addressing this too logically, but I just don’t see a solution here. So, he said, he
still wants to talk to a family member. I said I would pass it on.
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L. G. Barrile
So the next morning I got a call from the Board of Pardons and Parole, 7 in
the morning, I wasn’t trying to be rude or anything, but he said this is Victor
Rodriquez, we got your letter, we’re reading your letter as a board. He said, is
there anything you want to say, or whatever, and I said, haven’t you all made your
mind up already? I mean that’s kind of rude, calling me in the morning the day
of his execution to further cause anxiety. And he said, yeah, we have [made up our
minds]. But I remember thinking that was the most bizarre call I ever had.
If any one of us had told anyone on the board or called the governor’s office, then
they probably would not have executed him. That’s the feeling I got then, and that’s
the feeling I got after getting more information about it filtering back to me. The
problem still remained, that he would have gotten out. See now they’ve changed it.
We now have true life. We didn’t back then.
If indeed there were true life without parole would you have been inclined to
support it?
I might have. But I would have had to weigh how that recommendation, that action
would have played with intrafamily relations. In other words if others couldn’t
accept it, it wasn’t going to be my battle. I didn’t feel so strongly about it that it
would have been my battle. But did I need to see him dead? No, I did not need
to see him dead, [author’s emphasis] because he was out of sight, out of mind.
I had moved on. I put it away until . . . the execution.
And the family was pretty unanimous about it?
Oh yes, I was the only softie one.
It turned out that she was not the only “softie” in the family. Two other family
members did not want to publicly oppose the death penalty for fear of contradicting what they believed to be the family sentiment. A third family member
was ambivalent about its usefulness so long after the crime. It was much closer
to a 50/50 split in the family than anyone realized. If Case 19 had known the
true sentiments of her family members, she might have supported life without
parole had it been available.
In a similar vein, Case 39 succumbed to family sentiment, advocating the
death penalty in writing at their request even though he had forgiven the
offender and was troubled by what he perceived to be vengefulness. Case 39’s
parents were killed. He became terribly ill during the trial and attributed it
to the stress of the crime, extreme grief, and an obsession with the offender.
He was determined after recovering to purge himself of negativity. He began
praying for the soul of the offender, even instructing his then three-year-old
son to do the same. He reluctantly agreed with his family members to write
a letter for the victim impact statement supporting the death penalty, but
his heart was not in it. However, after the execution he said that he felt
an intense sense of relief. Notice that Case 39 forgives the offender to heal
himself psychologically and religiously. Furthermore, he impresses on his son
the importance of forgiveness, this despite the complete lack of remorse in
the offender.
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Murder Victim Family Members
As far as forgiving him, I did that prior to the execution. However, it was after
I went into the hospital with double pneumonia and almost died myself. At that
point I realized that I could not allow him to do any more damage to me and my
family than he had already done. It’s fairly easy to forgive people for the simple
things, but we must be able to forgive people for these types of things. Otherwise,
he wins. I know this is no game, but I refuse to let him occupy any more of my
thoughts. That would not be fair to my parents and uncle or any of my surviving
family.
As I told you on the phone, I had to tell my son that we had to pray for his soul.
Even though I had forgiven him, it was still hard to tell my son to do this. He was
only about three years old when it happened but he knew what was going on. This
was the perfect opportunity to teach him about forgiving. Every day following their
death, for a year, he would pick up the phone and just say “hello Meme, hello Papa,
I love you.” This of course broke my heart day after day. So, as you can see, I had
to forgive him. [from an e-mail sent after the interview]
It’s uh you know probably one of the hardest things I’ve ever done in my life
was to tell my son that we had to pray for him, you know that’s probably one of
the hardest things I’ve ever done in my life. . . . I mean we, we, we still, my son and
I we still pray for him at night you know before he [was executed] prayed for his
soul. [from the interview]
Well you know what, I’ve been so fortunate uh God just took this bitterness
away from me. I’ve never felt bitter towards him. I’ve never hated him. I’ve never
you know, but to pray for him is something else to do [nervous laughter] you know.
I can kind of put it on the back burner and did not think about him too much,
but you know I don’t let, I don’t let bitterness eat me up. It’s, I’m not gonna’ you
know he did his damage that day and that’s all he’s, all I was, that’s all I was
gonna’ allow him to do to my family. I wasn’t gonna’ teach my son to hate him; I
wasn’t gonna’ hate him. I wasn’t gonna’ spend my, the rest of my life and my time
and my energy being bitter and hatred towards this guy. He, the damage he did
that day, that’s where it stopped. I wasn’t gonna let him do anymore to me. [from
the interview]
His ambivalence about the death penalty and his reluctant conformity to his
family’s wishes are evident below, but so is the relief he received from the death
penalty:
I didn’t want to feel like I had any blood on my hands by trying, trying to convince somebody to take somebody else’s life, you know. I didn’t, I didn’t feel that, I
shouldn’t had had been a part of that, but my family wanted it. That’s what everybody in my family wanted and I figured if it was going to help them, then, then, I
was going to do it and I did, and after I did it, you know, I have to be honest with
you, after he was put to death I got a lot more closure out of it than I ever thought
I would.
Case 39 describes his ambivalent feeling about supporting the death penalty as
having, “blood on his hands.” His loyalty to his family, particularly their emotional well-being, suppressed any support he might have voiced for leniency.
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In an important way, praying for the offender’s soul allows his forgiveness to
be detached from supporting mercy in this material world, and permits him to
experience closure after the execution. His letter to the court supporting the
death penalty was his way, like Case 19, of avoiding potential family criticism
and being stigmatized as soft on a horrific crime against a family member.
Redemptive Forgiveness
Redemptive forgivers typically forgive because it is consistent with their
core values—religious, cultural, or political—and they reject the death penalty
as an inhumane punishment, which they see as cruel to the offender and his
family, and diminishing of society as a whole. Redemptive forgivers move to
the level of merciful compassion, of fully pardoning the offender. There was
only one survivor in the sample who fell into this category, and he is, in more
than one way, a singular case. He was the most distant of any survivor from
the victim, his daughter-in-law. While he was very angry and hateful at first,
he claims to have had little or no long-term reaction to the loss. He said he felt
sad about her death, but also felt sad at the offender’s death. Case 18 believed
that the murderer’s prison conversion to Christianity was genuine and forgave him. Case 18 said that his attitudes about the death penalty changed
and he was upset that the offender had been on death row for ten years, hoping and fighting for a commutation only to be executed. But Case 18 believed
that the offender’s newly found faith had helped him bear his time, and would
ultimately save his soul:
That’s horrible. That’s horrible. Ten years of wondering is there any way they are
not going to kill me. He’s sitting there for ten years hoping somehow there’s a
chance they might not kill him. You don’t know, but I heard that he had a spiritual change. And if he had some security in knowing where he was going, then it
might not have been as bad.
In the first part of this thing I was very sad, because we had lost her [his former
daughter-in-law]. [But] I never got the anger that my son got.
Case 18 externalizes the offender’s blame, arguing that the offender’s father
should be executed for the way he treated his sons:
I hear through the church that he had a conversion. I also heard through the
church that he was an abused child. Both of them [offender and his brother] were
abused children. So really we executed the wrong people. We should have executed
the daddy. Him, I have stronger negative feelings about. I didn’t realize it before,
but I feel more angry at the father doing this to the children than them doing this
thing [the murder].
Could he have said anything to you or your family?
It would have been good for him, you know, asking forgiveness. It’s good for the
person asking for it. I didn’t hate the man. I didn’t need to forgive him anything.
He hurt people I loved, but he hadn’t actually, how do I say this, [my estranged
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daughter-in-law] was not like my own child. I was not that close. So I don’t think
I would have enjoyed talking to him about his spiritual move. I just never did it.
I was too busy. I regret it a little now that I didn’t go talk to him.
What would you have said to the offender?
Right afterwards I would have had a hard time saying [anything]. What I would
say now would sound more like a Christian approach. We pay the price for big sins
and little sins. Yours was a big sin.
Do you think he should die for a big sin?
No. I think he should have had clemency and served a life term. I find that the
older I get the more I move away from capital punishment. Although when I was
younger I was strong about if you put somebody to death they won’t kill anybody
again. If people are repentant, I think we ought to forgive them. If they’re
not repentant, I don’t know how I feel. [author’s emphasis]
How about if the offender’s family came to apologize?
That’s totally inappropriate. It takes a lot, because that’s usually what gets
exploded at.
What do you think helped you the most in dealing with your loss?
Hearing that a man had a Christian conversion.
Redemptive forgivers would reject the death penalty out of hand, but notice
Case 18’s proviso about the offender’s need to express religious repentance
before he would consider complete forgiveness and mercy.
If the offender apologizes, forgivers typically accept his remorse as genuine. They are more likely than other survivors to request, or at least think
about, mediation dialogues with the offender. They are more likely than other
survivors to see the offender as redeemable spiritually if not behaviorally.
Empathy
Empathizers, like forgivers, humanize the offender. They perceive that the
offender is likely to have become dangerous because of his experiences, his miserable family life, or the failure of social institutions—such as social service
agencies and the criminal justice system—to take appropriate action. They
are more likely to spread the blame for his actions. They are also more likely
to know the offender. There were 6 empathizers, 4 of whom knew the offender
and 2 of whom also forgave the offender (Cases 18 and 19 discussed above).
Like forgivers they would accept an apology from the offender as genuine, and
they would be inclined to dialogue with the offender. They see the offender
as able to change. Yet they have conflicting feelings. They also believe the
death penalty will give a sense of relief or allay their fears and concerns that
the offender will harm people again. They typically understand the origins of
the offender’s violence, but they believe the offender may still be dangerous to
society.
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L. G. Barrile
Case 27 befriended the offender and introduced him to his friends before
his mother was murdered. But the offender was defensive and hostile. He
never fit in, and ended up in what Case 27 described as a “scrimmage” with
one of his friends. Case 27 saw the offender as a troubled, angry, “demented”
person who drank heavily, took illegal drugs, and never held on to a job. He
believes the offender became a better person in prison, one who might have
been an “asset” to society, helping those similar to himself. He was dramatically affected by the execution. In fact the execution elicited his empathy.
Notice how Case 27 externalizes the blame onto the offender’s neglectful and
abusive family:
Unfortunately several lives were lost because of parents not taking care of their
child, or people having children that shouldn’t have children, that didn’t take care
of them. So [the offender’s] life was taken, my mother’s life was taken, the little
boy that he drowned, and all because the mother refused to take care of the child.
To me that’s the thing. I felt sorry for him. I really did. . . .
How old was he when he drowned the young boy?
I heard he was around 14 and the heinous part of it, I mean he tied the boy’s
hands and pushed him in, off a raft and into a bayou just to watch him drown.
But again I go back to when he was young, four or so. His mother was drunk and
in a stupor and in a bar, abandoning him, not abandoning him but never around
to take care of him. And he, he got hit with a car, a truck, and that may or may not
have caused some damage to his brain. This is all stuff that I heard or read later
on that his father started raping him, if you would, at seven. You can definitely,
well not can, definitely mess up the frontal lobes of his brain. Um, so the boy never
stood a chance in life from the time he was born. He was doomed since the day he
was born.
I heard that someone tried to get in touch with his parents when he was being
released by probation, but they didn’t respond?
Well, correct, but ah, the mother, from what one of my sisters told me or heard,
they tried, tried to get a hold of the mother, and finally tracked them down to a bar
or what have you. And they said, I don’t want to have anything to do with him.
He’s trouble. And the grandmother tried calling the house one time and the phone
was busy and didn’t bother calling back until the day afterwards [the day after
the killing]. She said, you know, I tried calling about four or five days ago and
the phone was busy. I was going to try to tell y’all that he was bad news, and y’all
should watch out, but she never called back again.
Case 27’s explanation of the offender is an example of making sense or
explaining “why” after a homicide (Armour, 2003; Tilly, 2006). The reasons for
the tragedy are traced to the offender’s social experiences and familial and
societal neglect. His narrative is typical of empathizers who are more likely
to externalize blame and individual responsibility for crime. Contrast that
with most other survivors, who focus the blame for the murder on the individual’s immoral character, personality defects, or moral flaws. Empathizers
Murder Victim Family Members
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seem amenable to restorative justice strategies. If given the opportunity, they
would more likely dialogue with the offender, especially if he were remorseful. Indeed, Case 27 regrets that he did not speak with the offender before
the execution, though he expresses doubts that at that time he could have. The
execution itself was, oddly, an epiphany for him. It tore away the anger, apathy,
and repression, eliciting his empathy and sorrow for the offender:
I would have liked to have felt at the execution how I felt an hour and a half later.
And that’s my greatest regret that I did not say something to him. I do not blame
him. I do not blame him at all. I blame his mother and his father. And that’s it.
And I blame the justice system. There’s no such thing as minor’s records being
suppressed.
I no sooner got on the road after it happened, heading back from Huntsville to
Houston and could not drive the vehicle. I was so emotionally distraught. I completely fell apart. Just completely fell apart. Uh, ah, a couple of days after that I
couldn’t even, I started to say something. I went to my customers the next day or
two days later and I walked in and I stood at the door and he looked up at me and
I could tell he wanted to say something and he finally said, was that you on TV?
And I started to say yes and, you know, broke down. It was, it was, but yet I didn’t
even cry from the day it happened till, till then.
Yeah, but again, it was, the original thought was anger. He has to die, to feeling
sorry for the boy. I never felt sorry for him until that moment. And then I finally
realized that this is not his, his fault. This, it is his mother’s fault. It was tough.
And I still have a lot of work to do on myself personally. As therapists say, it’s a
continual process for the rest of your life.
He accepts the offender’s apology and it confirms his empathic feelings:
The apology had an effect. It meant everything to me. It affirmed what I knew down
inside. He would have been a good person.
But, confirming the simultaneity of dissonant sentiments, he supports the
death penalty:
Yes, before the execution I was for the death penalty. And it might sound twisted
but I’m still for the death penalty, not so much for a deterrent in crime, but almost
as a humanitarian side. When I walked through that prison and I looked at those
guys in those cells. . . . It’s not unjust. It’s cruel. It’s extremely cruel. And that’s
why I think they should be put to death, to let their soul go in whatever direction it
should be. The death penalty is humane. It’s much, much more humane than being
put in their cell.
Empathy and an understanding of social conditions only took this survivor so
far down the road toward forgiveness. For him redemption might be there in
the offender’s afterlife, but perhaps only temporarily for those inmates who
have reformed themselves in prison and reside on death row.
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L. G. Barrile
A similar complex stew of sentiments, compassion yet support for the death
penalty, exists in Case 25, whose adult sister was murdered. Like Case 27 he
knew the murderer, though much better as a workmate and friend. The
offender did not make any remorseful gestures during his entire time on death
row until his last statement, which Case 25 witnessed. Case 25 was saddened
about the death penalty, but said that it brought him closure: “It’s closed the
chapter on a 15-year book.” He also thought that it was deserved. He expressed
empathy for the offender’s family and the offender’s life, describing the murderer as fine when he wasn’t using drugs. But he saw the offender as uncaring
until faced with the certainty of death after all of his appeals were exhausted.
Ironically, as with Case 27, the execution brought the emotional issues to a
head for Case 25:
There was no remorse, nothing. I don’t know how to say it, but there was nothing
but selfishness in him every time we went to court with him till they set his death
date. Now as soon as they set his death date, he could hardly walk. I mean, he was
so out of it, I mean, he snapped to his senses, I think.
I think he thought it was all a joke until they set his death date. When they
set his death date that’s when I saw remorse in his eyes. But until that day, there
was no remorse, no nothing. He wasn’t trying to contact us or, you know, any type
of communication between us until the execution. It was actually minutes before
his death that he apologized or said any words at all to us. I mean it was seconds
before his death.
For Case 25 the execution was saddening, and his empathy emerges as he and
his family anticipate witnessing the execution:
We talked the whole way. Everybody was really, really nervous. We didn’t know
what to expect. Everybody felt very sorry for him. Because, I mean, I hate to see
another life taken.
Everybody did feel sorry for him?
Yeah. Absolutely. That’s the way I felt, I mean, everyone felt very remorseful and
very sorry for him. You know, and very sorry for his family.
You did want him to have the death penalty, but at the same time you saw it as a
waste of life?
Yeah. I did. You know I am a firm believer in an eye for an eye and a tooth for a
tooth, just as the book says. I am a firm, firm believer in that. And if you do the
crime then you do the time. But I did feel, I don’t know so much that I felt sorry for
him, but for his family, the people I had sorrow for.
He is definitely touched by the apology which he thinks is sincere:
I thought his apology was very sincere. I think he directed it toward the right
person which was [my niece].
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And he regrets the fact that he could not make contact with the offender before
the execution to talk. He was certainly a prime candidate for dialoguing, and
establishing a reparative interaction with the offender:
It disturbs me that I couldn’t contact him or I didn’t know. I didn’t have the
resources to contact him to, you know, ask him questions. Then again, if I ever
did have the ability to do that, would he do it?
Case 25 also has all the earmarks of emotional anomie from the execution. He
describes it as a flood of emotions. It resurrected the imagery and grief of his
sister’s death, and it restored the mourning process:
I mean when we were in that little chamber, oh my God the emotions. I mean, from
sorrow to, I can’t say from sorrow to happiness, but a full flood of emotions. I mean
from head to toe. I never, ever felt that way, nor would I want anyone else to feel
that way either. It was something else.
Do you think it was worth it to go?
Oh yeah, I had so much closure in my life since I went, since I attended that.
I mean, the first week I could hardly sleep at all without seeing him laying there
on the table. It was a very, very tough thing to see, but I don’t regret it one minute.
Did it bring back memories of your sister?
Absolutely it did. I thought about my sister suffering. Gee I had so many emotions
going through me at the time. I thought of, I mean, anything that had to do with
that situation was going through my mind. And, I mean, the whole family after
it was over, we all huddled together and just bawled and bawled and bawled till
probably midnight that night. It brought it back to day one.
The empathizers above were similar. They knew the offender and were close
to him at one time. They waited many years for the execution. They experienced an emotional storm from the execution that made them rethink their
feelings about the offender and enliven their mourning process. Unfortunately,
the appeals period in these cases seems to have alienated the survivors from
the offenders, but because the survivors knew the offenders it is likely that a
dialogue could have been successfully orchestrated.
DISCUSSION
The study focused on a subgroup of murder survivors, specifically forgivers
and empathizers, who (at first blush) appear more amenable to restorative
justice even in the face of the death penalty. Yet it was found that while they
forgave and empathized, most of them still supported the execution beforehand and experienced relief afterward. The forgive-but-die sentiment became
normalized in the narratives of the survivors and helped them make sense
of and thereby control the maelstrom of negative feelings and attitudes that
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26
L. G. Barrile
obstinately hung over them after the crime. Forgiving and empathizing clearly
reduced the survivors’ anger, hatred, and obsessive ruminations about the
offender and the crime.
Three types of forgiveness were identified—restrictive, ambivalent, and
redemptive. Restrictive forgivers implemented psychological and/or religious
reasons to forgive, but still supported the death penalty. Ambivalent forgivers
were not as supportive of the death penalty, but had serious concerns about the
offender’s release and/or their family’s negative reaction if they did not voice
their support for it. Redemptive forgivers reject the death penalty as inhumane and inimical to their cultural, religious, or political values, and support
life sentences over death.
Two of the forgivers in the study, one restrictive and one ambivalent, met
face-to-face with the offenders, which opened the opportunity for reconciliation. For the first time, these survivors could hear a genuine expression of
remorse, a plea for forgiveness from the offender, and could see the offender
in a different light. Yet both of them also desired the death penalty and were
relieved after it was administered.
From what the forgivers and empathizers expressed, there is room for
mediation dialogues, particularly in cases where the offender is remorseful. Notwithstanding the majority of the respondents’ support for the
death penalty, many of the forgivers and empathizers—whose offenders had
expressed remorse—believed that it would have been beneficial for them to
meet with the offender.
The implementation of restorative justice in death penalty cases is difficult, even in cases where the survivors are likely to be amenable to a mediation
dialogue. The postconviction appeals process, typical in death penalty cases,
constructs one of the main roadblocks to reconciliation. It encourages the
offender to hunt for ways to reduce his criminal responsibility and save his
life rather than to assume full accountability for his crime and apologize to the
family. The challenge is to somehow pierce the ubiquitous adversarial process
and encourage the offender to make amends, to be accountable, to apologize
for his acts, and perhaps to leave the world knowing that he attempted to
make peace with the victim’s family. That happened in the dialogues above,
and in several of the cases in which the offender offered remorse during his
last statement or in other communication with the survivor.
The interviews indicate that anger does dissipate over time, and that
support for the death penalty is at least partly sociological. Some forgivers
harmonized their stated opinion favoring the death penalty with their families, whom they believed supported the execution wholeheartedly. But they had
weaker internal support for it. They felt they would betray their family and the
victim if they publicly stated their uncertainty about the death penalty. And
most forgivers and empathizers believed the offender would remain a threat to
them and others if his life were spared. These may seem like rationalizations
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Murder Victim Family Members
to support the execution and reduce the dissonance of their sentiments, but
their concerns were palpable.
Sociological reasons may also underlie the respondents’ expressions of forgiveness. The interviews indicate that some forgivers were harmonizing their
sentiments with their religious communities or social circles. It seemed some
wanted to demonstrate that they had “moved on,” that they would not be
obsessed with the offender and the crime, and that they had performed the
religious directive to forgive. In stating forgiveness they escaped the social
stigma that is sometimes attached to victims, who have prolonged stress and
complicated grief. Undoubtedly, forgiveness helped their emotional well-being
by exorcising their obsessive anger and rumination. Forgiveness played many
roles for the survivors, though pardoning the offender was not usually one of
them.
The generalizability of this study’s findings are circumscribed by the sample, which is small, self-selective, and nonrandom. It is drawn from two states
with the greatest implementation of the death penalty, and consists of a majority of respondents who supported the death penalty, attended the execution,
and believed it to be justice for their loved ones. Yet despite the sample’s
limitations, the richness of the data furnishes insight into the sense-making
narratives of the survivors, revealing their sentiments about the victim, the
offender, the punishment, and communication with the offender. The study
sheds light on the seemingly contradictory forgive-but-die phenomenon, the
apparent dissonance between demonizing the offender and empathizing with
his social situation. Clearly, the survivors in this sample who spoke directly
with the offender and heard his remorsefulness were moved, as were the
offenders. Reconciliation and reparation, to a degree, took place.
For purposes of restorative justice this study indicates that the forgivebut-die sentiment is not a barrier to mediation. Yet while dialogues would be
beneficial to both participants, they are unlikely to alter survivors’ attitudes
about the death penalty, especially in Texas and Virginia. The death penalty is
not only on the books in these states, it is regularly implemented, and thus it
is expected as an ultimate punishment when issued by the courts. This cultural and institutionally legitimated expectation of the execution (Unnever
& Cullen, 2006; Zimring, 2003) makes it indeed difficult for survivors, even
forgiving and empathetic ones, to relinquish their approbation of it.
An uncommon but promising avenue for reconciliation is the family-tofamily dialogue, about which the respondents hint. Survivors who express
empathy toward the offender’s family (regardless of their animosity toward
the offender) might be amenable to an interfamily dialogue. But this is a delicate undertaking. Some of the respondents reported that the offender’s family
members pleaded with them to request a life sentence or excoriated them as
vengeful and bloodthirsty if they did not. Survivors feel insulted by both of
these stratagems. Furthermore, some survivors blame the offender’s family
for creating a dangerous violent criminal through neglect or abuse. Obviously,
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L. G. Barrile
in these cases dialogues are unworkable. However, when both sides are empathetic, dialogues can be therapeutic and ought to be sponsored. In effect, both
the offender’s family and the victim’s family commonly face a complicated
bereaving process; the offender’s family through anticipated grief before the
execution (Sharp, 2005).
The possibilities for rapprochement are illustrated in Case 8, in which
the offender and victim families were former in-laws. The offender killed his
ex-wife and her young daughter. Although the parents of the survivor and
offender were not close in the past, they supported each other emotionally
during the process. The victim’s father, Case 8, stated it this way:
We didn’t know his family from Austin before the crime. After the trial we talked.
We told them we didn’t blame them for what happened. They consoled us as much
as we consoled them.
Although the victim’s father supported the death penalty, he and his wife
openly dialogued with the offender’s parents, who offered sympathy and
remorse in behalf of their son. Similarly in Case 3 the brother of a murder victim, though he was an ardent supporter of the death penalty, reflects
on the remorseful and sympathetic statements made by the offender’s family
members:
I saw the mother and said I have nothing against you, but your son. She said she
understood. His mother had contact with my aunt. The sister of one of the perps
placed blogs online saying she felt bad for the victim’s family. That touched me.
[I thought at the time] it’s going to suck for them at his execution. The loss is the
same. I could hear his family at the execution. I felt bad for his mom.
Even where there was no direct contact, several survivors said that it would
have been heartening to hear expressions of sympathy or remorse from the
offender’s family members. However, the majority of respondents wanted nothing to do with them, especially when survivors blamed them for helping to
create a damaged character through their neglect or abuse. Some survivors
complained that it was unnerving to hear the offender’s family give excuses
and rationalizations at the sentencing hearing, at the courthouse during the
trial, and through statements made to the media or on the Internet.
There is strong evidence here that while the expression of sympathy and
remorse from the offender’s family is not a precondition for survivors to forgive, it is an important ingredient in orchestrating a reconciling dialogue even
many years later. Consider the extreme case of ethnic genocide in Rwanda
in 1994. The Association Modeste et Innocent (AMI), as part of the national
effort at reconciliation, is training released Hutus who had murdered Tutsis
20 years ago to express their remorse, to ask for forgiveness, and to render aid
to the survivors. The survivors typically accept the remorse and pardon the
murderer (Dominus & Hugo, 2014). Granted, the victimization occurred in a
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Murder Victim Family Members
civil war where politics played a central role, and most of the offenders live in
the same villages as the victims. Nevertheless these dialogues are imminently
reparative and would never have taken place if the death penalty was expected
and eventually implemented. AMI’s effort is an example of the need for and
effectiveness of peacemaking or compassionate criminology, where justice is
defined as open communication and negotiation (Pepinsky, 2006; Quinney,
1991, 1993).
In sum, while valuable insights were derived from the interviews in this
study, there is a need in future research to pursue more widely representative samples, particularly survivors in life without parole states and those who
reject the death penalty. Armour and Umbreit (2012) include the former, but
lack a sufficient number of death penalty cases after execution, thus disregarding the relief and sense of control experienced by these survivors. On the policy
front, this study suggests that advocating dialogues between offenders and
murder victim family members, even if they are conducted through electronic
devices such television, computer and telephone, or via mail, can be reparative
for both the offender and the survivor, regardless of the sentencing outcome.
NOTE
1. Productive sites used were the Associated Press archive (http://www.apnews
archive.com/NewsArchive/MainPage.aspx#?SearchText=executions&Display=&start
=0&num=10), Reuters Edition U.S. (http://www.reuters.com/news/us), United Press
International (http://www.upi.com/), Fight the Death Penalty in the USA (http://www.
fdp.dk/uk/exec/), Pro Death Penalty.com (http://www.prodeathpenalty.com/pending/
scheduled_executions.htm), and the Death Penalty Information Center (http://www.
deathpenaltyinfo.org/documents/FactSheet.pdf)—all of which contain news reports and
information regarding executions. Executions are also covered by local newspapers
where executions take place in Texas that are available online—the Austin Statesman
(http://www.statesman.com/), the Houston Chronicle (http://www.chron.com/), and the
Huntsville Item (http://itemonline.com/). This information was placed into the White
Pages website (http://www.whitepages.com/) to obtain addresses, but unfortunately
there were numerous people with the same names at different addresses, which led to
many false leads. To date 964 questionnaires have been mailed; many of them were
returned as undeliverable, many were returned by same-named but wrong persons,
and others were not returned at all.
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