Death-Penalty Juror Describes ​“Anguish” of Imposing a Death Sentence

Lindy Isonhood (click to enlarge picture) served on the Mississippi jury that sentenced Bobby Wilcher to death in 1994. In a commentary published on Medium, she writes that the decision to condemn Wilcher “continue[s] to haunt me today.” Isonhood—whose experience as a death-penalty juror is the subject of a new documentary film, Lindy Lou, Juror Number 2—explains how little she and her fellow jurors knew about the death-penalty system when they were tasked with determining Wilcher’s fate. They were unaware of the rarity of death sentences, the lack of adequate counsel, and changing public attitudes toward capital punishment. She describes feeling “guilt and complicity” for her role in Wilcher’s execution. “Judges, lawyers, prison guards, families of the victims and families of the condemned — along with ordinary jurors like myself — are swept into a world where judgments of death are handed down, but everyone else is expected to emerge untouched,” she wrote. The one-hour film, which will premiere on PBS on July 16, 2018, follows Isonhood’s journey to visit other jurors from the case and discuss their experiences. Isonhood met with Wilcher before his execution, and said, “I saw him as a fellow human being, flawed but caring, even towards me.” She concludes, “If I was called to serve on Bobby Wilcher’s jury today, I could not sentence him to death. I say this not because of what I learned about him before his execution, but because of what handing down a death sentence can do to people like me. I no longer feel as guilty about my decision in Bobby’s case, but I wish I could have foreseen how it would affect me and my loved ones for the rest of my life.”

(Lindy Isonhood, The Unseen Anguish of a Death Sentence, Medium, July 2, 2018; Florent Vassault, Lindy Lou, Juror Number 2, POV, July 16, 2018.) See New Voices. Photo courtesy Lindy Lou, Juror Number 2. The filmmakers have created a toolkit of materials for schools and community groups that would like to host a screening and discussion of the documentary.