At 10:05 p.m. Thursday, January 7, convicted serial killer Oscar Ray Bolin Jr. was executed by lethal injection in the State of Florida. The 53-year-old Bolin had been scheduled for execution at 6:00 p.m., but last-minute appeals for a stay of execution held up the execution for four hours.
Among the groups which opposed the execution was the Florida Conference of Catholic Bishops. Michael Sheedy, executive director of the Conference, wrote to pro-life Governor Rick Scott on January 5, urging him to stop all executions in Florida, beginning with Oscar Bolin. With Bolin’s execution, there have been 23 Death Row inmates executed under Governor Scott’s leadership.
In his letter, Michael Sheedy wrote,
“Our society is increasingly aware of the flaws in the application of the death penalty, which is inconsistent, arbitrary and too often applied in error. We note that last year, our nation marked a 25-year low in executions. Florida was one of only six states to carry out executions last year, and continues to lead the nation in the number of death row exonerations.”
Noting Governor Scott’s support for many pro-life measures during his tenure, Sheedy asked him to
“recognize that the life of each person has dignity and should be respected, even those who have done great harm.”
“It is time,” Sheedy wrote on behalf of the Florida bishops,
“for us to abandon the illusion that we can protect life by taking life.”
Many Catholic churches throughout Florida held prayer vigils prior to the execution, praying for Bolin’s three victims and their families, for Bolin himself, for our society which continues to impose violence in return for violence, and for an end to the use of the death penalty.
Where was the prayer vigil for those we task with guarding the heinous criminals we imprison?
I am disappointed by those who forget that ‘pro-life’ is shorthand for ‘pro-innocent human life’.
The parish parochial school I attended as a child is located in sight of one of the state’s most notorious prisons, we schoolchildren could see its walls from the school playground and even from some of the classroom windows. One day during an occasional current events discussion in the third grade class one of the sisters discussed crime, punishment, and the death penalty. Sister asked the class if any of us had an opinion about the death penalty. Only a few of our hands went up, maybe only one. Sister called on a girl to say why she thought the death penalty was a good idea. “My daddy is a guard at the prison and some of the convicts are in prison for life… ” she started and you can figure out the rest.
A third grade girl reminded us that prison guards are also innocent lives that must be defended and that prison guards are people too.