This guard who I write about hadn’t thought about what it was going to be like to get the family members of this condemned man to basically walk away from him so he could be strapped in the electric chair. The intensity of the emotions of the family members – he had just been married and his wife grabbed him and would not let him go – sobbing and the intensity of that, was completely unnerving to these corrections guards who were being ordered by other people who were far enough away not to hear the sobbing – the pain of trying to pull these people away.
It was impactful for me to witness that. I was standing with this [condemned] man and he was saying, “Bryan it’s been such a strange day – all day long people, the guards have been saying, ‘What can I do to help you? Can I get you something? Can I get you a coffee? Do you need the telephone? How can I help you?’”
More people said, “What can I do to help you?” in the last 14 hours of his life than the last 19 years of his life when he really needed it – when he returned from Vietnam drug addicted and traumatised – where were they? When he was struggling with drugs and alcohol – where were they? Seeing people moving around this man in his last hours, shaving the hair off his body so he would be a more efficient conduit for electricity that would kill him and watching these people try to do that – it was so clear that everyone there knew what was happening was wrong.
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