Two VHAC tour talks online

Two weeks ago you heard a lot about the Voices of Hope Agents of Change tour featuring death row exonerees and murder victims' families. Talks by two of our featured speakers, exoneree Juan Melendez and Rev. Walter Everett of Murder Victims' Families for Human Rights, are now available online at the website of The Verstehen Video Project. Check it out.

Andy in Harrisburg

Things that amaze me

It's late so this will be a short one. But I have a few thoughts, as we have wrapped Day IX of the VHAC tour.

The energy of Walter Everett of MVFHR is incredible. Walt is a retired Methodist minister. Well, actually, he flunked retirement and has a church part-time in Sunbury. He was with us twice last week, driving from his home in Lewisburg to Harrisburg for three events and then home in the evening, a 70 mile trip one-way. Then the next morning he drove another 70 miles or so to State College, did two events, and drove home, leaving Penn State at 9pm.

This week he traveled with us from Scranton on Monday to Bethlehem on Tuesday. After we wrapped in Bethlehem, after three events there, he drove home at 9:30pm, a 2 1/2 hour trip. Today he joined us again in Reading, another 2.5 hour trip, for an evening event at Albright College- where we were joined tonight by Ray Krone- and drove home again.

In between, he tended to one church member who is going into a nursing home and another who is dying.

I've known Walt for three years or so, but this tour has shown me a part of him I was not aware of. His energy is through the roof. Here's a 70-something guy who is telling the story of the murder of his son. He's doing it two or three times a day and then driving home at night to be with his wife and tend to his congregation. And through it all, he's cracking jokes and never shows any sign of irritation. Although, he does keep teasing me about getting lost in Bethlehem. We've done 20 events, we got lost once, and that's the one my tour mates remember.

Rolling Stone called Walt "serene and heartful, without an ounce of bombast." That is certainly true.

The other thing that amazes me is the story of Juan Melendez, and more specifically, the circumstances that led to his exoneration.

A police informant who knew Juan claimed that Juan and another friend committed the murder. The police leaned on the other friend, threatening him with the death penalty, and the guy took a plea bargain and agreed to testify against Juan. The testimony of a police informant and a coerced co-defendant- two men whom Juan said "had criminal records from here to California"- and no physical evidence landed Juan on death row.

The wheels began to turn in his favor when his new attorney discovered a taped confession from the real killer, which had been in the possession of both the prosecutor and Juan's court-appointed attorney since before the original trial. In addition, the prosecutor had 16 documents that corroborated the confession. These documents were not turned over to the defense at the original trial.

What if that tape didn't exist? Juan was sentenced to death on the basis of two questionable witnesses and no physical evidence. If that tape did not exist, Jeb Bush probably would have had Juan executed.

Juan calls the tapes and the documents two of his "miracles." It shouldn't take a miracle to free an innocent man from death row or keep him off death row in the first place.

Andy in Harrisburg

On the road again

After taking the weekend off for some R&R, the VHAC tour was back on the road. We loaded up the Mystery Machine and headed to Wilkes Barre and then Scranton yesterday on Day VII. For Day VIII, we're in Bethlehem.

Juan Melendez, the 99th death row exoneree in the modern era of capital punishment, has joined us for these two days. Ray Krone of York County, the 100th exoneree, will be with us tomorrow in Reading and Thursday in Lancaster. Walter Everett is back, representing Murder Victims Families for Human Rights.

Walt Everett and Juan Melendez share a laugh at Monday's event in Scranton.

Harold Wilson and Walt Everett talk with a local television station in Harrisburg.

Lorry Post addresses the audience at Broad Street Ministry in Philadelphia.

(L to R) Ashlee Shelton of Pennsylvanians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, Harold Wilson, Dr. Frank Baumgartner of Penn State, and Walter Everett enjoy some ice cream at the famous Creamery at Penn State.

Andy in Harrisburg

No sleep til Clarion

At midnight, we rolled into Clarion. Day IV of the VHAC tour took us to Penn State. Day V will take us to Edinboro and then Erie, which is a 200 mile trip from State College, so rather than biting off all 200 miles late at night or early in the morning, we stopped halfway, which is the sleepy college town of Clarion.

Because of the late hour, I will be brief. My bed here at the Holiday Inn is looking nice. But Harold Wilson, Walter Everett, Ashlee Shelton of PADP, and I were accompanied today by Penn State professor Dr. Frank Baumgartner. Dr. Baumgartner met us for lunch, attended an afternoon event with PSU's Amnesty International chapter, hosted dinner for us, participated in an evening event that also involved Harold, Walt, and I and was part of a series of discussions on "Reframing Public Policy Discussions," and, of course, made time for us to make a stop at the famous Creamery.

Dr. Baumgartner and several of his PSU colleagues conducted a multi-year project examining message framing in the anti-death penalty movement. They did this via a two-prong effort. First, they did a content analysis of The New York Times' coverage of the death penalty dating back to the 1960s. Second, they conducted experiments to see how people react to different arguments about capital punishment.

The analysis of the Times found that coverage of the death penalty has changed dramatically in the last four decades. Until the 1990s, most of the coverage was considered pro-death penalty. But beginning in the late 1990s, the tone of the coverage of the issue shifted to go deeper into problems with the operation of capital punishment.

In the experimental phase of the work, undergraduate students were given moral arguments for and against the death penalty. These arguments did little to move the previously held beliefs of the participants. Then they were given faux news articles about an innocent person on death row. This moved the participants' positions considerably, including those who started the experiment in support of capital punishment.

The work of Dr. Baumgartner and his colleagues resulted in the release of the book The Decline of the Death Penalty and the Discovery of Innocence, which was released earlier this year.

Today was Walt Everett's last day with us for this week. He's heading to Susquehanna University for their symposium Should the Death Penalty Be Abolished, a two day symposium that will feature Sr. Helen Prejean, among others. Tomorrow Lorry Post of Murder Victims' Families for Reconciliation will join us again for two days in Erie and Pittsburgh.

Andy in Harrisburg in Clarion

Planting seeds, one heart at a time

Day III of the VHAC tour featured three stops in Harrisburg and the first appearance by the Rev. Walter Everett of Murder Victims' Families of Human Rights. It's hard to give Walt's story justice in print, but I'll try.

Walt's 24-year-old son, Scott, was killed by a man who was high on drugs in 1987. As one might expect, Walt was devastated. And filled with rage. He was angry at the "faceless person" who killed his son. He was angry at the police whom he felt weren't giving the case enough attention. He was angry at the state's attorney who struck a plea bargain for involuntary manslaughter with a ten year sentence for the perpetrator.

But when Walt went to victims' families support groups, he saw people who were still angry 15, 20 years after the fact. He decided he didn't want to live with rage for the rest of his life.

And his life changed when Mike Carlucci, the man who killed Scott Everett, spoke in court. "I'm sorry I killed Scott Everett," Carlucci said the day he accepted his plea bargain. "I wish I could bring him back. Obviously, I can't.

"These must sound like empty words to the Everetts, but I don't know what else to say. I'm sorry."

(A great video on Walt and Mike is available here.)

On the one year anniversary of Scott's death, Walt wrote a letter to Mike and forgave him. Sometime after that, he visited Mike in prison. And after just three years in prison, Mike applied for early release. And Walt spoke at his parole hearing.

"Forgiveness has less to do with how you feel about the person than with how you want to feel yourself, to begin to heal," Walt says.

We stopped today in Harrisburg for three events. Our crowds were more intimate, but as I told the audience at Penn State Harrisburg, our friends in New Jersey told me that many of their events were with "eight people in the basement of Sisters of the Sacred Rosary." And they abolished the death penalty by doing that. We need each and every person we can find to move forward.

Death row exoneree Harold Wilson was with us today and will be for the rest of the week. I will have some photos to share soon. At the moment, I have the camera and Ashlee from PADP has the USB cord. But we'll have some photos up in the next few days. For now, I need rest.

Andy in Harrisburg

A broken promise for victims

Murder victims' families are told by prosecutors that the execution of their loved one's killer will bring them healing. And then the families are sent on a torturous path through the legal system. On Sunday, the Philadelphia Inquirer featured a front page story on the ongoing failure of Pennsylvania's death penalty system, illustrated by the ongoing overturning of death sentences.

Death row is all too real, countered Jules Epstein, a Widener University law professor who represents inmates appealing their cases. "There clearly is a death penalty in Pennsylvania," he said. "People get sentenced to death. People sit on death row. And the real reason people haven't been executed yet is because of tremendous problems within the system."

Last week the Pennsylvania Moratorium Coalition, of which ACLU-PA is a part, saw the occasion of the 200th overturned death sentence in PA since the reinstatement of capital punishment in 1978 as a reminder of the need for passage of PA Senate Bill 850. SB 850 would create a study commission on capital punishment, accompanied by a two year suspension of executions.

The Pennsylvania Moratorium Coalition (PMC) noted that the long list of vacated death sentences is indicative of a broken system. The Reverend Walter Everett of Murder Victims Families for Human Rights, a member of PMC, spoke to the impact on the families of homicide victims.

"They are promised ‘closure' once the offender is executed, and they wait for years and even decades for that ‘closure,' only to discover that the promise was a hollow one," said Rev. Everett, whose 24-year-old son, Scott, was murdered in 1987. "The death penalty is effectively a sentence to legal limbo for victims' family members.

"Families never forget, but they are entitled to begin to discover life again rather than to face a 15-20 year sentence of their own."

In May, Vicki Schieber took part in a press conference introducing PMC and SB 850. Vicki's daughter, Shannon, was killed in Philadelphia while attending Penn, and Vicki and her husband, Sylvester, opposed the death penalty for Shannon's killer, who is now serving a life term.



Andy in Harrisburg