Kathleen Garcia, a vic­tims’ advo­cate and expert on trau­mat­ic grief, recent­ly shared her opin­ions on the death penal­ty in New Hampshire, a state that is study­ing the issue through its Commission on Capital Punishment. Garcia, a mem­ber of New Jersey’s Death Penalty Study Commission, wrote, ​“Make no mis­take – I am a con­ser­v­a­tive, a vic­tims’ advo­cate and a death penal­ty sup­port­er. But my real life expe­ri­ence has taught me that as long as the death penal­ty is on the books in any form, it will con­tin­ue to harm sur­vivors. For that rea­son alone, it must be end­ed.” Garcia suf­fered through the mur­der of a fam­i­ly mem­ber in 1984, but has found the death penal­ty to be much more har­mul than help­ful: ​“It is my opin­ion, as well as the view of oth­er long-stand­ing vic­tim advo­cates through­out New Jersey, that our cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment sys­tem harmed the sur­vivors of mur­der vic­tims. It may have been put in place to serve us, but in fact it was a colos­sal fail­ure for the many fam­i­lies I serve.”

To ensure that inno­cent peo­ple are not exe­cut­ed, death penal­ty cas­es often take many years, and even decades, before reach­ing a res­o­lu­tion. As a result, mur­der vic­tims’ fam­i­lies inter­act with the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem for a much longer time than they would if the death penal­ty was not sought. Garcia not­ed, “[Victims’ fam­i­lies] endured mul­ti­ple tri­als, as well as the addi­tion­al trau­ma each one cre­at­ed in their frac­tured lives, leav­ing them feel­ing revic­tim­ized by the very sys­tem they once trust­ed to give them some sense of jus­tice. Meanwhile, fam­i­lies with dif­fer­ing opin­ions on the death penal­ty are divid­ed at the moment they need each oth­er most.” Adding to the trau­ma­tiz­ing expe­ri­ence is the dis­ap­point­ing real­i­ty that the needs of homi­cide sur­vivors are often over­looked, going with­out access to ongo­ing ser­vices, peer sup­port or afford­able, specialized counseling.

Garcia con­clud­ed, ​“I now believe that the death penal­ty must be end­ed and replaced with life with­out parole, a harsh pun­ish­ment that pro­vides vic­tims with the swift­ness and cer­tain­ty they need at a frac­tion of the cost in terms of dol­lars and human suf­fer­ing by homi­cide sur­vivors. Every dol­lar we spend on a pun­ish­ment that harms sur­vivors is one we are tak­ing away from the ser­vices that can address the emer­gent and long-term needs of all vic­tims.”

(K. Garcia, ​“Death penal­ty hurts — not helps — fam­i­lies of mur­der vic­tims,” Nashua Telegraph, March 28, 2010, op-ed (empha­sis added)). See New Voices and Victims.

Citation Guide