"A discussion with Sister Helen Prejean, CSJ, the author of Dead Man Walking, will highlight a two-day conference at Villanova University focusing on Catholic social teaching and criminal justice. Sister Prejean's discussion, "Dead Man Walking The Journey Continues, will take place on Tuesday, March 24, at 7 p.m. in Jake Nevin Field House, located on the campus of Villanova University. The event is free and open to the public.
Sister Helen Prejean, author of the best-selling book Dead Man Walking, which inspired the major motion picture by the same name, also wrote the 2004 book, The Death of Innocents: An Eyewitness Account of Wrongful Execution, which examines the flaws in the death penalty system. Prejean has appeared on 60 Minutes, ABC World News Tonight, the Phil Donahue Show, BBC World Service Radio, ABC's Primetime Live and PBS' Frontline, among others. "
2 comments:
"I hope what you learn here sets you on fire".
Sister Prejean, Preface, Death of Innocents
" . . .makes you realize the Dead Man Walking truly belongs on the shelf in the library in the Fiction category." "Being devout Catholics, 'the norm' would be to look to the church for support and healing. Again, this need for spiritual stability was stolen by Sister Prejean."
Victim Survivors, Dead Family Walking
From: I. Dead Family Walking: The Bourque Family Story of Dead Man Walking , by D. D. deVinci, Goldlamp Publishing, 2006
"On November 5, 1977, the Bourque's teenage daughter, Loretta, was found murdered in a trash pile near the city of New Iberia, Louisiana lying side by side near her boyfriend–with three well-placed bullet holes behind each head. "
www.deadfamilywalking.com/
contact T.J. Edler, 337-967-0840, cajunmixes@bellsouth.net
Sister Helen Prejean and the Death Penalty
Dudley Sharp, Justice Matters, contact info below
II. The Victims of Dead Man Walking
by Michael L. Varnado, Daniel P. Smith
comment -- A very different story than that written by Sister Helen Prejean. Detective Varnado was the investigating officer in the murder of Faith Hathaway. 2003
III. Death Of Truth: Sister Prejean's book The Death Of Innocents: An Eyewitness Account of Wrongful Executions.
For some years, there has existed a consistent pattern, from death penalty opponents, to declare certain death row inmates to be actually innocent. Those claims have, consistently, been 70-83% in error. ("ALL INNOCENCE ISSUES -- THE DEATH PENALTY")
Keep that in mind with "Death of Innocents".
Readers should be very careful, as they have no way of knowing if any of the fact issues in either of the two cases, as presented by Sister Prejean, are true. Readers would have to conduct their own thorough, independent examination to make that determination. You can start here.
Four articles
(a) "FOR GOOD REASON, JOE O'DELL IS ON DEATH ROW"
scholar(DOT)lib.vt.edu/VA-news/VA-Pilot/issues/1995/vp950728/07210224.htm
quote: "The DNA report commissioned by O'Dell and his lawyers actually corroborates O'Dell's guilt. There is a three-probe DNA match indicating that the bloodstains on O'Dell's clothing is indeed consistent with the victim Helen Schartner's DNA as well as her blood type and enzyme factors." "There is certainly no truth to O'Dell's accusation that evidence was suppressed or witnesses intimidated by the prosecution."
(b) "Sabine district attorney disputes author's claims in book"
www(DOT)shreveporttimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050124/NEWS01/501240328/1060
quote: "I don't know whether she is deliberately trying to mislead the public or if she's being mislead by others. But she's wrong,"
District Atty. Burkett, dburkett(AT)cp-tel.net
(c) Book Review: "Sister Prejean's Lack of Credibility: Review of "The Death of Innocents", by Thomas M. McKenna (New Oxford Review, 12/05). http://www.newoxfordreview.org/reviews.jsp?did=1205-mckenna
"The book is moreover riddled with factual errors and misrepresentations."
"Williams had confessed to repeatedly stabbing his victim, Sonya Knippers."
"This DNA test was performed by an independent lab in Dallas, which concluded that there was a one in nearly four billion chance that the blood could have been someone's other than Williams's."
" . . . despite repeated claims that (Prejean) cares about crime victims, implies that the victim's husband was a more likely suspect but was overlooked because the authorities wanted to convict a black man."
" . . . a Federal District Court . . . stated that 'the evidence against Williams was overwhelming.' " "The same court also did "not find any evidence of racial bias specific to this case."
"(Prejean's) broad brush strokes paint individual jurors, prosecutors, and judges with the term "racist" with no facts, no evidence, and, in most cases, without so much as having spoken with the people she accuses."
"Sr. Prejean also claims that Dobie Williams was mentally retarded. But the same federal judge who thought he deserved a new sentencing hearing also upheld the finding of the state Sanity Commission report on Williams, which concluded that he had a "low-average I.Q.," and did not suffer from schizophrenia or other major affective disorders. Indeed, Williams's own expert at trial concluded that Williams's intelligence fell within the "normal" range. Prejean mentions none of these facts."
"In addition to lying to the police about how he came to have blood on his clothes, the best evidence of O'Dell's guilt was that Schartner's (the rape/murder victim's) blood was on his jacket. Testing showed that only three of every thousand people share the same blood characteristics as Schartner. Also, a cellmate of O'Dell's testified that O'Dell told him he killed Schartner because she would not have sex with him."
"After the trial, LifeCodes, a DNA lab that O'Dell himself praised as having "an impeccable reputation," tested the blood on O'Dell's jacket -- and found that it was a genetic match to Schartner. When the results were not to his liking, O'Dell, and of course Sr. Prejean, attacked the reliability of the lab O'Dell had earlier praised. Again, as with Williams's conviction, the federal court reviewing the case characterized the evidence against O'Dell as 'vast' and
'overwhelming.' "
Sr. Prejean again sees nefarious forces at work. Not racism this time, for O'Dell was white. Rather, she charges that the prosecutors were motivated to convict by desire for advancement and judgeships. Yet she never contacted the prosecutors to interview them or anyone who might substantiate such a charge.
"(Prejean) omits the most damning portion of (O'Dell's criminal) record: an abduction charge in Florida where O'Dell struck the victim on the head with a gun and told her that he was going to rape her. This very similar crime helped the jury conclude that O'Dell would be a future threat to society. It supports the other evidence of his guilt and thus undermines Prejean's claim of innocence."
"There is thus a moral equivalence for Prejean between the family of an innocent victim and the newfound girlfriend of a convicted rapist and murderer."
"This curious definition of "the victims" suggests that her concern for "victims" seems to be more window-dressing for her cause than true concern."
(d) Hardly The Death Of Innocents: Sister Prejean tells it like it wasn't -- Joseph O'Dell
by Anonymous, at author's request
In lionizing convicted murderer Joseph O'Dell as being an innocent man railroaded to his 1997 execution by Virginia prosecutors, Sister Helen Prejean presents a skewed summary of the case to bolster her anti-death penalty agenda. While she is a gifted speaker, she is out of her element when it comes to "telling it as it was" in these cases.
Prejean got to walk with O'Dell into the death chamber at Greensville Correctional Center on July 22, 1997. However, she wasn't in Virginia Beach some 12 years earlier when he committed the crime for which he was arrested, convicted and sentenced to death. That is where the real demon was evident, not the sweet talking condemned con-man that she met behind bars. O'Dell was, in the words of then Virginia Beach Deputy Commonwealth's Attorney Albert Alberi (case prosecutor), one of the most savage, dangerous criminals he had encountered in a two decade career.
Indeed,O'Dell had spent most of his adult life incarcerated for various crimes since the age of 13 in the mid-1950's. At the time of the Schartner murder in Virginia, O'Dell had been recently paroled from Florida where he had been serving a 99 year sentence for a 1976 Jacksonville abduction that almost ended in a murder of the female victim (had not police arrived) in the back of his car.
The circumstances of that crime were almost identical to those surrounding Schartner's murder. The victim of the Florida case even showed up in Virginia to testify at the trial. Scarcely a mention of this case is made in the Prejean book.
Briefly, let me outline some of the facts about the case: Victim Helen Schartner's blood was found on the passenger seat of Joseph O'Dell's vehicle. Tire tracks matching those on O'Dell's vehicle were found at the scene where Miss Schartner's body was found. The tire tread design on O'Dell's vehicle wheels were so unique, an expert in tire design couldn't match them in a manual of thousands of other tire treads. The seminal fluids found on the victim's body matched those of Mr. O'Dell and pubic hairs of the victim were found on the floor of his car.
The claims that O'Dell was "denied" his opportunity to present new DNA evidence on appeals were frivolous. In fact, he had every opportunity to come forward with this evidence, but his lawyers refused to reveal to the court the full findings of the tests which they had arranged to be done on a shirt with blood stains, which O'Dell's counsel claimed might show did not have the blood marks from the defendant or the victim.
Manipulative defense lawyer tactics were overlooked by Prejean in her narrative. O'Dell was far from a victim of poor counsel. As matter of fact, the city of Virginia Beach and state government gave O'Dell an estimated $100,000 for his defense team at trial. This unprecedented amount nearly bankrupted the entire indigent defense fund for the state. He had great lawyers, expert forensic investigators and every point at the trial was contested two to five times.
There was no "rush to justice" in this case.
O'Dell's alibi for the night of Schartner's murder was that he had gotten thrown out of the bar where he encountered Schartner following a brawl. However, none of the several dozen individuals supported his contention - there weren't any fights that night. Rather, several saw Miss Schartner getting into O'Dell's car on what would be her last ride.
But Prejean would want us to believe the claims of felon Joseph O'Dell. He had three trips to the United States Supreme Court and the "procedural error" which Prejean claims ultimately doomed him was the result of simple ignorance of basic appeals rules by his lawyers.
Nothing in the record ever suggested that Joseph O'Dell, two time killer and rapist, was anything but guilty of the murder of Helen Schartner.
Justice was properly served.
IV. Sister Helen Prejean on the death penalty
"It is abundantly clear that the Bible depicts murder as a capital crime for which death is considered the appropriate punishment, and one is hard pressed to find a biblical ‘proof text’ in either the Hebrew Testament or the New Testament which unequivocally refutes this. Even Jesus’ admonition ‘Let him without sin cast the first stone,’ when He was asked the appropriate punishment for an adulteress (John 8:7) - the Mosaic Law prescribed death - should be read in its proper context. This passage is an ‘entrapment’ story, which sought to show Jesus’ wisdom in besting His adversaries. It is not an ethical pronouncement about capital punishment .” Sister Helen Prejean, Dead Man Walking.
The sister’s analysis is consistent with much theological scholarship. Also, much scholarship questions the authenticity of John 8:7.
From here, the sister states that “ . . . more and more I find myself steering away from such futile discussions (of Biblical text). Instead, I try to articulate what I personally believe . . . ” The sister has never shied away from any argument, futile or otherwise, which opposed the death penalty. She has abandoned biblical text for only one reason: the text conflicts with her personal beliefs.
Sister Prejean rightly cautions: "Many people sift through the Scriptures and select truth according to their own templates." (Progressive, 1/96). Sadly, Sister Prejean appears to do much worse. The sister now uses that very same biblical text “Let the one who is without sin cast the first stone” as proof of Jesus’ “unequivocal” rejection of capital punishment as “revenge and unholy retribution”! (see Sister Prejean’s 12/12/96 fundraising letter on behalf of the Saga Of Shame book project for Quixote Center/Equal Justice USA)
V. Redemption and the death penalty
The movie Dead Man Walking reveals a perfect example of how just punishment and redemption can work together. Had rapist/murderer Matthew Poncelet not been properly sentenced to death by the civil authority, he would not have met Sister Prejean, he would not have received spiritual instruction, he would not have taken responsibility for his crimes and he would not have reconciled with God.
Had Poncelet never been caught or had he only been given a prison sentence, his character makes it VERY clear that those elements would not have come together. Indeed, for the entire film and up until those last moments, prior to his execution, Poncelet was not truthful with Sister Prejean. His lying and manipulative nature was fully exposed at that crucial time. It was not at all surprising, then, that it was just prior to his execution that all of the spiritual elements may have come together for his salvation. It was now, or never.
Truly, just as St. Aquinas stated, it was Poncelet's pending execution which may have led to his repentance. For Christians, the most crucial concerns of Dead Man Walking must be and are redemption and eternal salvation.
For that reason, it may well be, for Christians, the most important pro-death penalty movie ever made.
In the book, murderer Patrick Sonnier stated: "I don't want to leave this world with any hatred in my heart. I want to ask your forgiveness for what me and Eddie done, but Eddie done it".
Prejean says: "(Patrick Sonnier) seems to accept that he is responsible for what had happened, even though he claims not to have killed the teenagers. ... I suspend judgment. With the electric chair waiting, with death close like this, who the triggerman was seems not the point."
The most important point of any Christian ministry is salvation. If the most important part of any Christian ministry is saving souls, and Sonnier is lying, and redemption is undermined, that seems a very important point. What could be a more important point for a death row ministry? Ending the death penalty?
In the movie, murderer Matthew Poncelet repeats the final words of one of the real murderers, Robert Willie: "I would just like to say ... that I hope you get some relief from my death. Killing people is wrong. That's why you've put me to death. It makes no difference whether it's citizens, countries, or governments. Killing is wrong."
Here, tragically, hauntingly, it seems that Sister Prejean has taught Willie to be an anti death penalty activist. The crucial elements of atonement, expiation, responsibility and forgiveness are replaced by the classic anti death penalty saying that all "Killing is wrong", the amoral position of equating murder and execution, violent crime and just sanction, the guilty murderer with the innocent victim - the worst set of messages for the murderer's redemption.
In his final statement, , Dennis Gentry, executed April 16, 1997, for the premeditated murder of his friend Jimmy Don Ham, stated: "I’d like to thank the Lord for the past 14 years (on death row) to grow as a man and mature enough to accept what’s happening here tonight. To my family, I’m happy. I’m going home to Jesus." As the lethal drugs began to flow, Gentry cried out, "Sweet Jesus, here I come. Take me home. I’m going that way to see the Lord." (Michael Gracyk, Associated Press, Houston Chronicle, 4/17/97).
We cannot know if Gentry or the two real murderers from the DMW book really did repent and receive salvation.
But, we do know that St. Aquinas advises us that murderers should not be given the benefit of the doubt. We should err on the side of caution and not give murderers the opportunity to harm again.
"The fact that the evil, as long as they live, can be corrected from their errors does not prohibit the fact that they may be justly executed, for the danger which threatens from their way of life is greater and more certain than the good which may be expected from their improvement. They also have at that critical point of death the opportunity to be converted to God through repentance. And if they are so stubborn that even at the point of death their heart does not draw back from evil, it is possible to make a highly probable judgement that they would never come away from evil to the right use of their powers." St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles, Book III, 146.
VI. On God and the death penalty
"(Sister Prejean) received nothing but a stony silence, however, when she questioned the basis of the biblical crucifixion story as a "projection of our violent society." "Is this a God?" Prejean asked about the belief that God allowed his son, Jesus, to be sacrificed for the sins of humanity. "Or is this an ogre?" "The audience -- to that point in strong agreement with the author of "Dead Man Walking" -- said and did nothing." ("God, ogre comparison doesn't fly with interfaith crowd", Paul A. Anthony, Rocky Mountain News, 03:35 p.m., August 24, 2008).
It is understandable that the audience was stunned. Sister Prejean is questioning the bedrock of the Christian faith.
Appropriately, Pope Benedict XIV appears to rebuke her a few days later: "If to save us the Son of God had to suffer and die crucified, it certainly was not because of a cruel design of the heavenly Father. The cause of it is the gravity of the sickness of which he must cure us: an evil so serious and deadly that it will require all of his blood. In fact, it is with his death and resurrection that Jesus defeated sin and death, reestablishing the lordship of God." ("It Is Not 'Optional' for Christians to Take Up the Cross", 8/31/2008) http://www.zenit.org/article-23515?l=english
None should have been surprised.
It is not uncommon for persons of faith to create a god in their own image, to give to that god their values, instead of accepting those values which are inherent to the deity. Sister Prejean states, in reference to the death penalty, that "I couldn’t worship a god who is less compassionate than I am."(Progressive, 1/96).
She has, thereby, established her standard of compassion as the basis for God’s being deserving of her devotion. If God’s level of compassion does not rise to the level of her own, God couldn’t receive her worship.
Director Tim Robbins (Death Man Walking) follows that same path, "(I) don’t believe in that kind of (g)od (that would support capital punishment and, therefore, would be the kind of god who tortures people into their redemption)." ("Opposing The Death Penalty", AMERICA, 11/9/96, p 12). Robbins establishes his standard for his God’s deserving of his belief. God’s standards do not seem to be relevant. Robbins' sophomoric comparison of capital punishment and torture are typical of the ignorance in this debate, are remarkably similar to the ogre message from Sister Prejean in Denver and reflect no biblical relevancy.
The movie scene where Poncelet is raised, vertical, arms outstretched on the gurney, seems an obvious recreation - a visual representation of Christ's crucifixion. That was a conscious decision on the part of director Tim Robbins. It was not in the book and no execution gurney raises in such a fashion. Would it be a reach to call that blasphemous?
Perhaps they should review Matthew 5:17-22 and 15:1-9.
And be cautious, for as the ancient rabbis warned, "Do not seek to be more righteous than your creator." (Ecclesiastes Rabbah 7.33)
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Detective Varnado writes: "For those who believe in the teachings of Sister Helen Prejean as her journey continues in her effort to abolish the death penalty. 'For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. And, no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light. 2 Corinthians 11:13 & 14' " -- From Detective Varnado's new book Soft Targets; A Women's Guide To Survival
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Permission for distribution of this document, in whole or in part, is approved with proper attribution.
Dudley Sharp, Justice Matters
e-mail sharpjfa@aol.com, 713-622-5491,
Houston, Texas
Mr. Sharp has appeared on ABC, BBC, CBS, CNN, C-SPAN, FOX, NBC, NPR, PBS , VOA and many other TV and radio networks, on such programs as Nightline, The News Hour with Jim Lehrer, The O'Reilly Factor, etc., has been quoted in newspapers throughout the world and is a published author.
A former opponent of capital punishment, he has written and granted interviews about, testified on and debated the subject of the death penalty, extensively and internationally.
Pro death penalty sites
homicidesurvivors.com/categories/Dudley%20Sharp%20-%20Justice%20Matters.aspx
www.dpinfo.com
www.cjlf.org/deathpenalty/DPinformation.htm
www.clarkprosecutor.org/html/links/dplinks.htm
www.coastda.com/archives.html
www.lexingtonprosecutor.com/death_penalty_debate.htm
www.prodeathpenalty.com
http://yesdeathpenalty.googlepages.com/home2 (Sweden)
www.wesleylowe.com/cp.html
Sister Helen Prejean: Why fact checking and critical thinking are important
RE: STEPHANIE SALTER: Death penalty foe’s ‘awakening’ still a compelling story
http://www.tribstar.com/opinion/local_story_104224012.html
From Dudley Sharp
I agree with Sister Prejean: “you've got to get real knowledge". And to get "real" knowledge, you must fact check.
Prejean's comments as "Prejean".
My reply as "Sharp REPLY"
Prejean: Sarcastically, she says: “As if we can have a designer death penalty,” “I don’t want it for everybody, I just want it for my criminal.”
Sharp REPLY: We actually do have an extremely limited "designer" death penalty, that can only apply to around 10% of all murders, based upon SCOTUS guidelines, which, as a general description, are the defining of a capital murder as a murder with specific aggravators, known as secondary aggravating circumstances.
This Sister knows this and was just snowing folks with rhetoric she knew to be false.
Prejean: "Once a government decides it is all right to kill anybody, you are going to have the whole spectrum.”
Sharp REPLY: As the Sister well knows, SCOTUS has continuously put more limitations on death eligible prosecutions. She knew this bit of storytelling was false, as well.
Prejean: Prejean said. Killing is killing, and it is immoral.
Sharp REAL: Of course, killing is not killing, unless one amorally or immorally, equates the rape and murder of children with the execution of the rapist, murderer, or the 13 million slaughtered in the Holocaust with those executed for carrying it out. Her comment is common anti death penalty moral blather.
Prejean: “What do you think they write in as the cause of death” after an execution, she asked her audience in Dede I in Hulman Memorial Student Union. “Homicide.”
Sharp REPLY: Well, OK, Sister, what would you recommend, "Death by lethal injection as a legal sanction for the rape and murder of children?"
Prejean: “Every single person who’s been strapped down and killed in this state has been killed in your name.”
Sharp Reply: True, just as every murderer who was released from prison and then murdered, again, was released in your name.
Prejean: None of us, including murderers, amounts only to his or her worst deeds.
Sharp REPLY: Jurors are well aware of that, yet, they still give a death sentence based upon the most just and appropriate sanction for the crime committed, in the context of both the life of the murderer and, let's not forget, the innocent murder victim, who was also much more than an innocent murder victim.
Prejean: No society’s legal system is so perfect, omniscient and equally applied that it can guarantee innocent people will not be executed or even that all defendants will receive proper legal representation. Thanks to efforts such as “The Innocence Project,” Prejean noted, more than 130 people have gotten off death row in the United States via DNA or other exonerating evidence.
Sharp REPLY: The 130 is a continuous scam that has nothing to do with actual innocence. This has been well known, for many years, by anyone willing to do a tiny bit of fact checking. Possibly 25 actual innocents have been identified and released from death row, since new death penalty sentences were given after Furman v Ga.
See "The 130 innocents scam", http://homicidesurvivors.com/2009/03/04/fact-checking-issues-on-innocence-and-the-death-penalty.aspx
In addition, the Sister fails to tell anyone that innocents are more protected by the death penalty.
see http://homicidesurvivors.com/2009/01/30/the-death-penalty-provides-more-protection-for-innocents---new-mexico.aspx
Prejean: Killing someone for having killed someone else not only contradicts Christ, it doesn't heal the wounds of loss in loved ones left behind.
Sharp REPLY: It most certainly does not contradict Christ and the Sister knows that, as she wrote in "Dead Man Walking".
Prejean: Victims’ families she has spoken with who did not want prosecutors to press for execution, she said, have been told they must have “condoned” their loved one’s slaying or, incredibly, “It’s a shame you didn't love your child.”
Sharp REPLY: I would like to see how many confirmable examples of this that Sister Prejean can produce, if any.
Prejean: Sixty-two family members of murder victims helped convince New Jersey lawmakers to throw out that state’s capital punishment statutes, she said, and others just persuaded New Mexico’s Legislature to do the same.
Sharp REPLY: Some reality is needed. Neither state used that as a reason they got rid of the death penalty. (1) If we could do a random survey of parents whose children had been murdered, I strongly suspect that the polling would show in excess of 90% supporting the death penalty. 80% of the US supports the death penalty for true, capital murders. (2) We do have one, very good, anecdotal example. 168 innocents were murdered in the 1995 bombing of the Oklahoma City Murrah Federal Building. Let's say that there are 800 adult family members who really cared about those 168 murder victims. It is probably much greater. Out of those 800, one family member, or 0.125%, has become an anti death penalty activist. I think that speaks volumes as to how representative it is of family members who oppose execution.
NOTE: Death penalty opponents have done a good job at finding and encouraging such family members to come forward. There is an organized anti death penalty movement. There is not any organized pro death penalty movement. But, reality does have a place in the discussion.
Again, I agree with Sister Prejean: “you've got to get real knowledge".
(1) SEE "How bad can death penalty repeal get? The New Mexico and New Jersey examples", Dudley Sharp
(2) See "Death Penalty Polls - Support Remains Very High", Dudley Sharp, April, 2009
Permission for distribution of this document, in whole or in part, is approved with proper attribution.
Dudley Sharp, Justice Matters
e-mail sharpjfa@aol.com, 713-622-5491,
Houston, Texas
Mr. Sharp has appeared on ABC, BBC, CBS, CNN, C-SPAN, FOX, NBC, NPR, PBS , VOA and many other TV and radio networks, on such programs as Nightline, The News Hour with Jim Lehrer, The O'Reilly Factor, etc., has been quoted in newspapers throughout the world and is a published author.
A former opponent of capital punishment, he has written and granted interviews about, testified on and debated the subject of the death penalty, extensively and internationally.
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