PENALTY

Nigel Rodley, member and a long time Chair of Human Rights Committee,
describes the process of broadening and deepening of the human rights
consciousness that has led to the death penalty to be discussed in human
rights terms. If the state is the principal guarantor of human rights, why
would the state then deprive anyone from the inherent right to life?
Christof Heyns, the UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary and
arbitrary executions, and Thomas Probert, his colleague from the University
of Pretoria, point to an emerging consensus that at least the practice of executions
is no longer acceptable for the UN human rights mechanisms, leaving
states to determine the best manner in which to achieve a moratorium.
Regional organizations can act as important fora for discussion of trends
towards abolition that are more regionally, and perhaps culturally, sensitive.
DEATH PENALTY: VICTIMS’
PERSPECTIVE
Sister Helen Prejean 1
Over the three decades I have been engaged in accompanying the
condemned on death row and seeking every means I know to save
their lives, I have also come to know many murder victims’ families.
At first, I was so intimidated by the enormity of their loss and sorrow
that I avoided them. I wondered why they would want to have anything
to do with me, working passionately to abolish the very penalty
they were seeking. Staying away from them was a very big mistake.
I’ve learned a lot since, and I wish to share some of what I’ve learned
with you, whom I regard as our most representative global forum to
achieve peace.
I’m pleased that you’re hosting a forum to explore the plight of
murder victims’ families vis a vis the death penalty. In my experience
I’ve seen over and over the tragic effects that government’s imposition
of death to the offenders wreaks on these families, despite the popular
perception (or, perhaps, at root, the political assumption) that only
the execution of the perpetrator is capable of rendering “justice” to
those harmed by their crimes.
We couldn’t have a more direct view into the tragic dynamic that
occurs between victims’ families and the death penalty than what
happened in Boston on June 24, 2015: the day of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s
formal sentencing to death for his participation in the Boston
Marathon bombing in 2013. As part of this proceeding, victims’ families
are allowed to present Victim Impact statements about how the
crime has affected their lives, which is unspeakably horrible. As they
testify about their loss, grief, and traumatized lives, most believe the
death penalty is justified, and some express their defiance by refusing
to call themselves “victims,” determined to carry on with their lives.
Not all, however, seek death. Some want to see Mr. Tsarnaev live
1 Sister Helen is a Roman Catholic nun, a member of the Congregation of St. Joseph and a leading
American advocate for the abolition of the death penalty.
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