Berry Candlelight Vigil

I just received word that there will be an interfaith candlelight vigil at Smith Park on Wednesday, May 21 beginning at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday is the day Earl Berry is scheduled to die at the hands of the Mississippi justice system.

Rev. Fred Hammond of the Jackson Universal Unitarian Church wrote the following regarding the death penalty and the Bounds family: "...the execution was to take place the end of October 2007. The Bounds family gathered to witness the execution, a horrible soul wrenching process to put anyone through, and then 18 minutes before the event the governor ordered a stay of execution because of the pending US Supreme court case on lethal injections. In a story [in T]the Clarion-Ledger, daughter Jena Bounds Watson states, 'It’s very stressful. More than I ever imagined it would be. It hit us like a brick in October. We didn’t expect it to hit us so hard. It was like she’d died all over again.'

"This is not justice. This is not closure. This is not healing. This is perpetuating a living hell.

"... Our system has failed both Mr. Berry and the Bounds family. Life imprisonment as a sentence would have allowed the Bounds family to move on in their lives. Instead they have been waiting, emotively waiting for the sentence of death to be meted out. They have been waiting to witness the execution to put this finally behind them and have been forced to painfully endure our system’s barbarism.

"...many victim’s families, once they have had time to reflect, are able to shift to see that an eye for an eye response is not the answer. Taking revenge wounds the spirit of the family far more than the crime. The death penalty should be repealed if only because to carry such a sentence out places more pain and suffering upon the victim’s families preventing them to begin the healing needed."

 
posted by on 05/16/08 at 03:50 PM. [printer-friendly version]   

posted by Walt on 05/19/08 at 09:36 AM