Jeanne Woodford (pic­tured), the for­mer direc­tor of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation and Warden of San Quentin dur­ing 4 exe­cu­tions, recent­ly became the Executive Director of Death Penalty Focus, one of the largest non­prof­it advo­ca­cy orga­ni­za­tions in the nation ded­i­cat­ed to repeal­ing cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. During her years in cor­rec­tions, Woodford came to the con­clu­sion that the death penal­ty was waste­ful, dis­crim­i­na­to­ry and failed to make the pub­lic safer. She recent­ly spoke about her con­flicts in pre­sid­ing over exe­cu­tions: ​“I nev­er was in favor of the death penal­ty, but my expe­ri­ence at San Quentin allowed me to see it from all points of view. I had a duty to car­ry out, and I tried to do it with pro­fes­sion­al­ism. The death penal­ty serves no one. It does­n’t serve the vic­tims. It does­n’t serve pre­ven­tion. It’s tru­ly all about ret­ri­bu­tion.” Woodford added, ​“There comes a time when you have to ask if a penal­ty that is so per­ma­nent can be avail­able in such an imper­fect sys­tem. The only guar­an­tee against exe­cut­ing the inno­cent is to do away with the death penalty.”

(C. Williams, ​“Former California pris­ons leader joins fight against death penal­ty,” Los Angeles Times, May 11, 2011). Read more New Voices.

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