As Utahns move toward repeal of the death penalty, proponents of state executions continue to offer two fundamentally flawed justifications for maintaining death sentences: that it is the only way to bring justice to victims and it is necessary to protect the public.
Sadly, prosecutors are at the forefront of trying to persuade grieving families that the prolonged suffering that follows a decision to pursue a death sentence is required to bring a just resolution to the case. In truth, there is no justice in a death sentence, only more death.
Once execution is on the table, the defendant is guaranteed the highest level of due process. That process will play out for decades due to the constitutional requirements imposed before a state can take a life. During the years of appeals, the perpetrator will become a regular feature in news stories nationwide, while the victim becomes one of many details. Meanwhile, the family’s understandable resentment and rage will continue to be dredged up as they wait impotently for “justice to be served.”
What prosecutors fail to realize is that no judge or jury can serve justice by destroying life. No life is disposable, no taking of human life is just. As heinous as a person’s actions may be, the sanctity of their lives remains; a sanctity the state must protect for all, less life become a bargaining chip, which it has with death penalty cases.
Prosecutors have testified in the past that they want death sentences as a tool. Human life should not be a “tool.” Prosecutors who rely on hitting a defendant over the head with a death sentence to get a plea bargain need better evidence or training, not the “tool” of a threatened execution.
Similarly, the idea that a death sentence is necessary to protect public safety is a convenient fiction. In the United States, we have highly developed prison systems that are quite capable of protecting the public without killing the inmates. (Though private prisons are less effective at this, Utah, thankfully, has no such prisons.) Violence in prison, corrections officials agree, can be addressed with proper staffing and training. If legislators are concerned about inmates committing murder in prison, providing funding for much-needed officers would be far more effective than keeping the death penalty.
We cannot overcome crime by executing criminals. We cannot restore the lives of victims by ending the lives of their murderers, though we can cause the families more damage by dragging out the case, as the death penalty does.
The Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City encourages state lawmakers to promote a justice system that provides restitution for victims, security for society and the opportunity for rehabilitation to the convicted. We urge the state to remember that the death penalty is not a simple cost-benefit analysis, it is a calculated decision to destroy a human life. The state should not make such decisions.
We prayerfully, humbly, respectfully, and with great hope that Utah will lead by example, ask our state legislators to repeal the death penalty.
Jean Hill is government liaison for the Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City.
