VICTIMS: Murder Victim’s Daughter Says ​“Broken” Death Penalty Doesn’t Bring Closure and is ​“A Waste”

Dawn Mancarella, whose mother, Joyce Masury, was murdered 20 years ago, called the death penalty “a waste of energy and money [that] doesn’t bring justice or closure.” Sharing her views on the death penalty in a column for Connecticut’s Register Citizen, Mancarella expressed support for the Connecticut Supreme Court’s 2015 decision declaring the death penalty “incompatible with contemporary standards of decency in Connecticut.” “It’s disappointing to see that the court is re-visiting this decision,” she wrote, “but I hope they will affirm the original decision and leave the death penalty behind us.” Mancarella said that the death penalty forces victims’ family members to “go through the pain of reliving their loved one’s murder over and over again, year after year” through the lengthy appellate process. This, she says, “is the opposite of justice and closure — even if the convicted offender is put to death in one, ten or twenty years, the anguish of losing your loved one never goes away and a state appointed execution doesn’t make you feel any better.” She contrasts the energy and money expended on the death penalty with the state’s treatment of programs to help victims’ families heal: “it is beyond frustrating to see millions of dollars invested into a single capital case,” she says, “while victims’ services are perpetually underfunded.” She concludes, “It is time to give back our misplaced time and energy to the survivors of homicide for their healing and truly honoring their loved one.”

(D. Mancarella, “FORUM: Capital punishment a waste of energy and money,” The Register Citizen,” January 21, 2016.) See Victims and New Voices.