I Forgive You, but You Must Die: Murder Victim Family Members, the Death Penalty, and Restorative Justice

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

Previous studies have noted that in some capital cases, victim family members express forgiveness of the offender, empathy for his family, or for his adverse life experiences—but still support the execution. This article attempts to explain the phenomenon by identifying three types of forgiveness and the motives for them, and it explores the applicability of reparative dialogues between murder survivors and offenders. Empirical evidence comes from 52 interviews and/or open-ended questionnaires with survivors whose capital cases ended in an execution in Texas or Virginia. Most of the 52 survivors witnessed the execution, supported the death penalty, and rejected remorse when it was expressed by the offender. Yet some of them forgave the offender, empathized with the offender or his family, or were ambivalent about the death penalty, despite supporting the execution—the “forgive but die” sentiment. This subset of survivors—forgivers and empathizers—who are the most amenable to mediation dialogues are the focus of this study.