Chad Nykiel (FGCU): “Death Penalty (Personal Experience)”

Would your opinion change on the death penalty if your best friend was murdered?

Prior to my sister-n-law’s best friend being murder in 2005 I used to not support the death penalty.  I used to believe that there were innocent people sent to prison for murder every day.  Those that have been sitting on death row for a while might have not had the opportunity to have DNA evidence to help prove their innocence.  Also maybe their witness testimony was not truthful or their might have been new evidence that was found to support their innocence.

However, once the situation becomes real to you, you stop and think about it. How could this of happened to someone I know?  Why are individuals sometimes let go so easily after being found guilty?

            In my sister-n-law’s case, the person who murdered her best friend, had been recently released from a federal prison in Texas for a very similar crime, taking someone he knew hostage.  He had only been out of prison for approximately 10 months when he came to Ohio and moved in with his current girlfriend.  On this particular night, he became angered and pulled out a shot gun from his locked gun safe in his home and shot his girlfriend and her seven year old son.  He then ran from police through the woods and showed up at my sister-n-laws condo.  My sister-in-law and her roommates were in their early 20’s enjoying life, but had no idea what was about to happen. 

            That Friday night my sister-n-law had received a call from her father, who came in town unexpectedly, and wanted to go out to dinner with her. She had invited her roommate and best friend to go with her, however she decided to stay home.  While running from the cops the murderer broke into my sister-in-laws house and held her roommate hostage.  Her roommates name was Sarah and that night she was murdered after a twelve hour standoff.  She was in no way related to the family of the murderer and was totally innocent.  What makes the case even more frustrating is that the murderer pleaded mentally unstable.  He claims that he has mental issues and therefore that he was guilty by reason of insanity (that he was not responsible for his actions).  I find this hard to believe considering this already had happened once and then he was let go. 

            So I ask you this…How can you not be responsible for your actions?  Did he not already go to prison for a similar act?  Did you not understand that when you purchased guns and ammunition that you potentially might use it in a fit of anger [again]?

Once you experience a situation such as this and how the after affects impact people that you know and love, you start to think differently.  How can you make the pain go away?  How do you help those address the reoccurring questions like, will this happen again?  What if my sister-in-law had been home that night?  Could she have saved Sarah?  

            It is 4 years later and my sister-n-law can’t be left alone at night because she has a fear that someone will break in.  They have a very expensive security system in their home due to this.  Also she has trust issues due to what happened that night.

Now the murderer sits on death row, fighting his conviction.  He now claims that he was set up by the SWAT team and that he is not responsible for his action due to his mental issues.  He also claims that the police lied that night.  I believe that he is wasting tax-payers dollars because he does not have his own lawyer.  On the night he was arrested in 2005, he admitted that he killed all his victims and that he should make it as easy on his victim’s families as possible.  However, he obviously does not care about that any more.  Now it is about his survival.  I wish he would have thought about his wife’s, kid’s, or Sarah’s survival at that time.

So yes, my opinion has changed on the death penalty.  I believe that most of those who have committed a hideous crime like this all have a story on why it isn’t them.  I feel that people need to take responsibility for their actions!

Nationally, 48% of Americans favor the death penalty compared to 44% who prefer life without parole (www.nyadp.org/main/faq).  If you had a story like the above wouldn’t that sway your opinion to favor the death penalty?  If you commit the crime then you have to face the consequences.  “The death penalty is not now, nor has it ever been, a more economical alternative to life imprisonment”(users.rcn.com/mwood/deathpen.html).

So now I believe that in order to get convicted  there has to be some pretty strong evidence that you are innocent.  Also I believe in the right to a fair trial even if it does take a long time.  I believe that there may be some who slipped through the cracks, however, I believe a lot who are on death row did the crime.  So again I ask you would your opinion change about the death penalty if someone you knew and cared about dearly was murdered for absolutely no reason?

This entry was posted on 8. April 2009 at 02:43 and is filed under Introduction to Sociology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.