The Impact of the Death Penalty on Jurors

During a recent pre­sen­ta­tion at Valparaiso University, Sister Helen Prejean (pic­tured) engaged in a dis­cus­sion with the school’s pas­tor, Rev. Joseph Cunningham. Responding to a remark that Prejean had made about defense attor­neys only need­ing to con­vince one juror to vote against the death penal­ty, Cunningham told Prejean that he had been fore­man of a jury that sen­tenced a man to death in 1995. He remarked that he is still deal­ing with the emo­tion­al toll of that expe­ri­ence, stat­ing, ​“I ache every day. That is why I want­ed to meet you. I’m a wound­ed soul.”

Prejean devi­at­ed from her own remarks to dia­logue with Cunningham, who not­ed, ​“As a juror, when you hold the gun, when you smell the blood on the sheets…all that, just every day I relive all that. The pic­tures and the chil­dren. … I dread the day he’s exe­cut­ed.” Since the tri­al, Cunningham said he has made con­tact with the defen­dant, who remains on death row in Indiana, but he has not gone to see him. Regarding the dis­tance he has put between him­self and the defen­dant, Cunningham said, ​“I’m a rela­tion­al per­son in my min­istry. Developing a rela­tion­ship with him and then hav­ing to watch him die or know that he died and that I .…” Prejean offered com­fort to Cunningham and told him, ​“Your deci­sion part­ly came out of a very trau­ma­tized man.”

(Northwest Indiana News, March 29, 2006). See DPIC’s report Blind Justice: Jurors Deciding Life and Death With Only Half the Truth. See also Arbitrariness and New Voices.