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Dateline Death Row: On Watching a Man Die
"Number 6-2-6..."
Yes, that's the first part of my raffle ticket.
"...1-4-4."
"That's me!" Normally, I would have shouted out, "I win!" But this was no time to celebrate. My lucky blue raffle ticket meant I'd won the "privilege" of watching a man die.
Executions in Delaware still make the national news, I'm happy to say. America still finds them unusual enough to mention. But this state -- as small as it is -- is getting a large reputation as one that not only sentences its prisoners to death but follows through. Eight men have been executed here since 1992; 11 more await identical fates.
On this night, a man named James B. Clark, Jr., age 39, was to die by lethal injection for murdering his adoptive parents in 1994. As a radio journalist in Wilmington, I get to cover all kinds of events, many of which inspire thoughts that can never be fully expressed in the few minutes or even seconds I have to get a story across.
But this time, I had not been assigned to watch James die; I was only asked to cover his death from the makeshift media center set up in a staff training room where witnesses describe the event afterward. And anyway, this execution was small potatoes compared with the hanging that had taken place two months before.
It was my choice to put in for the raffle. A morbid curiosity, perhaps; or a chance to explore the connections between criminals, their victims, and what we perceive as justice.
James Clark, Jr., was an infant when he was put up for adoption -- allegedly the product of a one-night stand. He would turn out to be Betty and James, Sr.,'s only child. By the time young James could walk, he became violent. He was expelled from preschool for beating up other children, and as he grew, he was in constant trouble. Despite several years of counseling, he still could not control himself.
Finally, at 16, James was given a 30-year sentence for strangling a 3-year-old nearly to death. He served 21 years, and just a month after his release, he shot and killed his elderly parents.
I had never seen...