Who will listen?

Christian Century, Sept 20, 2005

WHO WILL LISTEN? Janice Brown opposes the death penalty, but she admits that when her daughter's killer was executed in Texas, she experienced some relief: "I don't have to deal with him anymore," she says. Still, she had longed for an encounter with him, to ask him why he killed her daughter, and to impress upon him how devastating was her loss.

Her requests for a meeting with him were denied. Instead, she was permitted to meet with another murderer, a man who said he would kill again if given the chance. She told the man about her daughter's murder, and listened to him talk about growing up with an abusive father and about his youthful plots to kill his father. At the end, the man said he would never kill again. Brown feels he reached this conclusion because someone finally listened to his story (Ellis Cose, Bone to Pick, Atria Books).