Below is the schedule of events for the second day of the 2010 Anti-Death Penalty Alternative Spring Break, Tuesday, March 16. You may come to all the events or just individual sessions. Everyone is welcome. You do not need to register, just show up for the events. It is all free.
It starts at noon on Tuesday. The location is the Jesse H. Jones Communication Center - CMA room 3.112 on the campus of The University of Texas at Austin. CMA is on the corner of Whitis Avenue and Dean Keeton, (Google Map). The room is located on the entrance level of the building.
Noon to 1 PM: "Religious Views of the Death Penalty” presented by Steven Crimaldi, National Director of Dead Man Walking School Theater Project. Steven will also explain how students can get involved by doing a production of the play at their schools or in their communities.
2:30-3:30 Mary K. Poirier, mitigation specialist from The McCallister Law Firm. Mary will discuss her work on capital trials in Texas and elsewhere and how activists can work with legal teams. A good mitigation specialist can save someone from being sentenced to death.
3:30-3:45 Break
3:45- 5:00 PM Bill Pelke, president of Journeyof Hope … From Violence to Healing will speak and present a film of the work of Journey of Hope ... From Violence to Healing. The film documents family members of murder victims speaking out against the death penalty. Also, we will introduce and hear comments from another special guest arriving Tuesday, death row exoneree Curtis McCarty who spent 19 years on death row in Oklahoma.
5:30 PM - 7:30 PM Petition Signature Gathering Competition: We will divide into teams and fan out throughout Austin to collect signatures on a petition against the death penalty. People can collect signatures at places such as where SXSW events are taking place such as the convention center, outside certain bookstores or other stores if they allow it, on the streets in downtown Austin and wherever else the teams want to try. The team that collects the most petition signatures (with names, addresses, email addresses and possibly phone numbers) will win a prize of $100.
Evening Free time on your own for enjoying Austin
Join us March 15-19, 2010 in Austin, Texas for the award-winning Anti-Death Penalty Alternative Spring Break.
Special guests will be six innocent death row exoneress: Shujaa Graham, Curtis McCarty, Ron Keine, Derrick Jamison, Perry Cobb and Juan Melendez. They are attending alternative spring break to speak with participants about how innocent people can end up on death row. Altogether, the six exonerees attending the alternative spring break spent a total of about 65 years on death row for crimes they did not commit.
The Journey of Hope will have a team in Kentucky, November 2-5, 2009.
Shujaa Graham, murder victim family member and exonerated death row inmate, Terri Steinburg, a mother whose has a young son, Jason, on death row in Virginia, and Bill Pelke, murder victims family member and president of the Journey of Hope will conduct a speaking tour sponsored by the Kentucky Coalition to Abolish the death penalty.
Novemer 2: 12p.m-1p.m state of affairs radio show 5:30p.m-7p.m University of Louisville
November 3: 7p.m-8:30p.m Georgetown
November 4: 3:30p.m-5p.m Eastern Kentucky University (EKU) followed by dinner at the Alumni Club with some faculty and staff
November 5: 11a.m-12p.m Bellarmine College 6p.m-7p.m Western Kentucky University (WKU)
To donate to Journey of Hope...from Violence to Healing : Send checks or money orders to: Journey of Hope...from Violence to Healing P.O. Box 210390 Anchorage, AK 99521-0390
Rachel King wrote about me several times.It is way past time for me to write something about her.
Rachel’s family has requested contributions to the National Coalition the Abolish to Death penalty, in lieu of flowers in her memory Rachel helped the abolition movement in many ways.Most people have no idea of the extent.To really know and understand Rachel, you need to read her works.It would honor her if you to took the time to read what she wrote.You would see first hand her contribution to the movement.
I got to know Rachel pretty well when she was writing her first, and I think greatest book, Don’t Kill in Our Names: Families of Murder Victims Speak Out Against the Death Penalty. Check out any of these links to know Rachel and her work better.
Another very important piece by Rachel was NOT IN OUR NAME: Murder Victims Families Speak out Against the Death Penalty. It was a project of Barb Hood and Rachel’s during her stint as the inaugural Director of Alaska Against the Death Penalty..The first printing was in 1997 and has since been updated and reprinted at least 4 times.Barb and Rachel began their project with pictures and interviews that were taken during the Virginia of Hope in 1996 Rachel used the message of Murder Victim’s Families for Reconciliation as the introductions for their work in photos and personal stories.Her message for this book was MVFR’s message:
“In the aftermath of a murder, we often hear cries for the death penalty.For centuries, killing people to punish them for killing has been a part of our culture.But in recent decades, the justifications that have long sustained the death penalty in the public mind have been largely discredited. For example, studies now show that the death penalty does not deter violent crime, and instead may provoke it;that executions are much more costly than life imprisonment, not less costly; and that police find the death penalty among the lease effective crime-fighting measures that many politicians and prosecutors would have us believe.
As reasons for supporting the death penalty grow thin under scrutiny, proponents often fall back on the old stand-by question: Well, what if someone in your family was murdered?Wouldn’t you want their murderer to die?This is meant to disarm us.“Of course,” we are expected to say.After all, our culture has long supported killing for killing.But as people who have experienced first-hand the effects of murder, we are here to say,
“NO—NOT IN OUR NAME.”
We are members of Murder Victims Families for Reconciliation, a national organization of family members who have lost relatives to murder to execution by the State.We oppose the death penalty in all cases, and work instead for alternatives to the death penalty.We promote policies that prevent violent crime and programs that help victims heal and rebuild their lives.We know too well the horrible effects of killing, and how important it is that the cycle of killing in this country be broken. We can’t stop all violence, but we can work to stop the violence carried out by a government that kills in our names.
Murder Victims Families for Reconciliation was founded in 1976 by Marie Deans of Richmond, Virginia, after the murder of her mother-in-law Penny.Since that time the organization has become a leader in the abolition movement, both nationally and internationally.Since 1993, MVFR’s “Journey of Hope…from Violence to Healing” tours have helped spread the message to communities across the U.S. that executions are terrible memorials to people we love.”
Again, Rachel’s family requested that contributions be made to The National Coalition to Abolish the Death penalty in lieu of flowers.The NCADP is the leading organization in this country solely dedicated to the abolition of the death penalty.It is an organization that is worth your investment.Rachel invested in this organization and wanted you to do likewise.
Rachel King and I were both elected to the NCADP board in 1996 and we both had the privilege of serving as chairpersons on that board. Rachel was also honored by the NCADP to receive the Lifetime Achievement Award. She believed strongly in the NCADP and in the Executive Director Diann Rust-Tierney. Diann, and all us have lost a great friend.An investment to the NCADP will go far in helping abolish the death penalty and in honoring Rachel.
The Journey of Hope blog has been memorializing Rachel King since her death on Monday.I invite you to check out what others have said in her memory.
We have listed many personal comments as well as blog posting of MVFHR, ACLU, NCADP and others.Read how Marshall Dayan, Jack Payden-Travers, Ron Carlson, Phyllis Pautrat, Renny Cushing, Diann Rust-Tierney and others are remembering and honoring Rachel during this time.
The Journey of Hope blog would love for you to add your words of honor in her memory.
I will also be adding some additional blogs during the next few days sharing my thoughts and feelings about Rachel.I will share some special moments like the time in 1996 when she shaved her head to join Sam Reese Sheppard in solidarity and fun.This was years before she lost her hair the second time due to chemo.
There is the story about how Don’t Kill in Our Names, caused Common Courage Press to back out of their agreement to publish my book Journey of Hope...from Violence to Healing in early 2003. I was still able to get the book printed in time travel with Rachel on an Alaskan book tour sponsored by Alaskans Against the Death Penalty in 2004.We promoted our books and each other.
Rachel kept a journal on her illness and her friends were updated by Journal reports sent out from time to time.I will share some of her thoughts of experiences she encountered as she courageously fought for life.She was a great battler.We can all learn from her.She is a heroine.
She was an angel sent from God.
Young people in the movement have someone to look up and to emulate.Who can fill her giant footprints?Maybe Rachel Lawler, Maybe Ashley Kincaid, Maybe Will McAuliffe, or Maybe you.
With this small glimpse of her life I hope you got to know Rachel King a little better.Show honor by reading her words and spreading them.Show honor to her by supporting her causes.
Her stories and her causes will help bring abolition of the death penalty.It is up to us how long that will take.
As an anti-death penalty activist one of the questions that I often hear is "If one of your loved ones was murdered. Do you still support the death penalty?" It is hard to answer this question since I have never been in that situation. However, I can always point out to many Murder Victim' Families that decided not support the death penalty such as Marietta Jaeger, Ron Carlson, Bill Pelke and George White. These video clips are taken from the documentary "Step By Step A Journey of Hope" produced by Micki Dickoff.
Marietta Jaeger's daughter Susie was abducted at the age of seven during a family camping trip in Montana. For over a year afterwards, the family knew nothing of Susie's whereabouts. Shortly before the one-year anniversary of Susie's disappearance, Marietta stated to the press that she wanted to speak with the person who had taken her child. On the anniversary date, she received a call from a young man who taunted her by asking, "So what do you want to talk to me about?"
During the year following Susie's disappearance, Marietta had struggled to balance her rage against her belief in the need for forgiveness. Her immediate response to the young man was to ask how he was feeling, since his actions must have placed a heavy burden on his soul. Her caring words disarmed him, and he broke down in tears on the phone. He subsequently spoke with Marietta for over an hour, revealing details about himself and the crime that ultimately allowed the FBI to solve the case.
Marietta was to learn that Susie had been killed on a remote Montana ranch a week after she disappeared. Despite her family's tragedy, she remains committed to forgiveness and has been an ardent opponent of the death penalty for the over 25 years since Susie's death.
Ron Carlson's sister, Deborah Ruth Carlson Davis Thornton, and Jerry Lynn Dean were murdered with a pick ax by Karla Faye Tucker and Daniel Ryan Garrett on June 13, 1983. Both Tucker and Garrett were sentenced to death. Ron originally supported their sentences, telling the prosecutors, "I think they got what they deserved." Ron lost his stepfather and natural father within a year of Deborah's death. "You can't imagine the anger that was in this body," he says now. For many years, Ron treated his pain with alcohol and drugs, until becoming a Christian and turning his life "over to the Lord" in 1990. Ron ultimately forgave Karla and Dan and worked hard to commute their death sentences.
Dan died in prison of natural causes in 1993. Despite widespread appeals on her behalf, Karla Faye Tucker was executed on February 3,1998, in Huntsville, Texas. Ron was invited by Karla to witness the execution as one of her representatives. When he did so, he become the first known victim's family member to witness an execution on behalf of the murderer. Ron's decision caused rifts within his family that remain to be healed. But most family members still offer their love and support. And Ron knows he made the right decision. "I drew strength from the Lord, and I knew he was here. God reached out of heaven to hold us in his hands and cradle us with his love and compassion. Karla died with a smile on her face. They took her body, but they didn't kill her spirit."
Bill Pelke's 78 - year - old grandmother Ruth, taught Bible lessons to neighborhood children in Gary, Indiana. One day, May 14th, 1985, four ninth grade girls from the local high school come to her door asking about the lessons, and she invited them into her home. As she turned to get information for them, one grabbed a vase and hit her over the head. Another pulled a knife out of her purse and began to stab her. Ruth was stabbed a total of 33 times. While one of the girls held the knife inside her, the others ransacked her house. They ended up with $10.00 and her ten-year-old car.
A year later, one of the girls, Paula Cooper, was sentenced to death for the crime. She had been 15 when the murder occurred, and at 16 became the youngest female on death row in America. Originally supportive of Paula's death sentence, Bill eventually forgave Paula, began corresponding and visiting with her, and worked to overturn her sentence. She is now serving 60 years in prison. Bill recently retired after over 30 years of service with Bethlehem Steel and plans to devote his retirement to abolishing the death penalty. He recently purchased a tour bus to travel across the country and spread the message of forgiveness and hope.
On February 27, 1985, the White family experienced first-hand the insanity and horror of murder. George and his wife Charlene were shot repeatedly by an armed robber at his place of business in Enterprise, Alabama. George held Charlene in his arms as her life slipped away. Their children, Tom and Christie, were only 12 and 5 at the time. The nightmare had just begun. Sixteen months later, George was charged with murdering his wife. Following a capital murder trial that was later described as "a mockery and a sham", George was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. His conviction was overturned in 1989 and he was released from prison, but George remained in legal limbo until 1992, when proof of his innocence was finally brought forward. Following a brief hearing the trial court ordered the charge against him forevermore dismissed. The nightmare had lasted more than seven years...had the State of Alabama had its way, George White would be a dead man today.
Understanding fully how easy it is to become advocates for revenge, the White family, however, rejects the death penalty as a solution and as way of healing the wounds of their loss.
