Leland Anderson served as a judge in Jefferson County, Colorado, sen­tenc­ing one man to death while spar­ing anoth­er. In a recent op-ed in The Denver Post, Anderson wrote how those cas­es affect­ed him: ​“Those cas­es con­tin­ue to haunt me even to this day, many years after hav­ing signed off on the deci­sions with a trem­bling heart.” He said his views on the death penal­ty have changed since he was on the bench: ​“I have had much time to reflect on the expe­ri­ence of judg­ing anoth­er person’s life or death. The con­clu­sion I have reached is that I can no longer sup­port the death penal­ty even though I once vot­ed in favor of exe­cut­ing a man…. What I have final­ly come to real­ize is that I can­not sup­port the death penal­ty because what I hold dear­est in life is the promise of redemp­tion.” Anderson con­clud­ed ​“that the death penal­ty rep­re­sents an anti-life force in soci­ety,” and called for an end to capital punishment.

(L. Anderson, ​“Abandon the death penal­ty, retired judge urges,” Denver Post, March 7, 2013). Colorado’s leg­is­la­ture will be tak­ing up a bill to repeal the death penal­ty. See New Voices and Recent Legislation.

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