Policy Issues
Victims’ Families
Murder victims’ families hold a variety of views on the death penalty. Studies suggest the death penalty does not bring closure and interferes with their healing process.
Policy Issues
Murder victims’ families hold a variety of views on the death penalty. Studies suggest the death penalty does not bring closure and interferes with their healing process.
Tragically, every capital murder case involves at least one deceased victim. Vindication for victims and closure for victims’ families are often held out as primary reasons for supporting the death penalty. However, many people in this circumstance believe that another killing would not bring closure and that the death penalty is a disservice to victims.
The families and associates of the victims (sometimes called “covictims”) can play a key role in how a case proceeds in the courts. The prosecution may consult with the families on whether to seek the death penalty or to accept a plea to a lesser sentence. If death is pursued, family members may be asked to testify at the sentencing phase to describe the impact the murder has had on their own lives. Victims’ families often speak at legislative hearings on the death penalty, both in favor of and in opposition to a death penalty statute.
Statistically, the race of the victim can be relevant to the issues of arbitrary application and racial discrimination in the death penalty. Studies have shown that death cases disproportionately involve white victims in the underlying murder.
Victims’ family members who oppose the death penalty are sometimes ignored if the prosecution is intent on seeking the most extreme punishment. In addition, victim impact statements at sentencing proceedings can be so dramatic and powerful as to overwhelm any mitigating factors presented about the defendant’s life history.
DPIC keeps track of the race and gender of all victims in cases where there has been an execution. The voices of victims’ families are highlighted as offering an important and unique perspective on the death penalty.
Jul 27, 2020
When Attorney General William Barr announced in July 2019 that the federal government planned to resume fede…
Read MoreVictims' Families
Jan 26, 2023
In North Carolina and Nevada, family members of murder victims are speaking out against the death penalty, encouraging officials in both states to commute their death row. At a press conference (pictured) outside the North Carolina gove…
Innocence
Dec 08, 2022
In Shattered Justice: Crime Victims’ Experiences with Wrongful Convictions and Exonerations, released in August 2022, University of North Carolina-Wilmington sociology and criminology professor Kimberly Cook explores how crime vic…
Race
Sep 07, 2022
As federal prosecutors consider what punishment to seek against the accused gunman in the May 2022 mass shooting at a Tops Supermarket in Buffalo, survivors and family members of victims of the shooting are concerned that pursuing…
International
Aug 30, 2022
On the eighth anniversary of the August 19, 2014 murder of kidnapped journalist James Foley, a U.S. federal district court in Virginia sentenced his killer, Islamic State militant El Shafee Elsheikh, to eight life sentences in pri…
Prosecutorial Accountability
Aug 22, 2022
The Tarrant County District Attorney’s office has asked the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (TCCA) to vacate Paul Storey’s death sentence, saying that his trial prosecutor “blatantly lied” to his …
Victims' Families
Jul 21, 2022
If Alabama executes Joe Nathan James on July 28, 2022 for the murder of Faith Hall, it cannot claim to be doing justice for her or her family. Hall’s two daughters, Terrlyn and Toni Hall
Victims' Families
Mar 09, 2022
New Hampshire State Representative Robert “Renny” Cushing (pictured), a longtime victim-advocate who led the Granite State’s successful efforts to repeal the death penalty, died March 7, 2022 after a multi-year battle with prostate cancer.
Victims' Families
Mar 07, 2022
The U.S. Supreme Court has overturned a federal appeals court decision that had reversed the death sentences imposed on Dzhokhar Tsarnaev for his role in the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings that killed three people …
Victims' Families
Feb 08, 2022
Children of family members who have been sentenced to death or executed are among the most hidden trauma victims of capital punishment. To help address their unique mental health needs, the National Child Traumatic Stress Network (NCTSN), an organ…
Victims' Families
Oct 27, 2021
Three years after the religiously-motivated attack on Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue, the status of the state and federal prosecutions in the case remains unsettled. As the three Jewish congregations who wors…