June 25th Editorial
Salt Lake City Tribune
As a family member of a murder victim I always pay attention to the legal wrangling and appeals of convicted killers. I read death penalty pros and cons and listen to descriptions of executions.
Salt Lake City Tribune
As a family member of a murder victim I always pay attention to the legal wrangling and appeals of convicted killers. I read death penalty pros and cons and listen to descriptions of executions.
For 25 years, the man who murdered my mother has been on death row in California. The attorney general’s office there used to call me yearly to report on the appeals process. So many years of waiting for the sentence to be carried out does not leave me with any kind of closure. I would have closure already if he had just been sentenced to life in prison without parole.
This man also has two children. When I saw the daughter of Ronnie Lee Gardner interviewed, I felt sad. That was her father being put to death. She now will also suffer permanent loss.
The death of my mother’s murderer will not bring her back; my children will still not know their grandmother. But the family of the convicted murderer will lose someone. The State of California, like the State of Utah, will have committed an act that resolves nothing, took 25 years, and unnecessarily cost tax payers hundreds of thousands of dollars or more.
Beth Dunford
Park City
