July 29, 2005

Pro-life supporters pray to stop
state execution of inmate

By Mary Ann Wyand

Indiana Death Row inmate Kevin A. Conner said last week that he doesn’t want to grow old in prison and won’t seek clemency.

As The Criterion went to press on July 26, Conner was scheduled to be executed by chemical injection shortly after midnight on July 27 at the Indiana State Prison in Michigan City, Ind., for the Jan. 26, 1988, murders of Steven Wentland, Anthony Moore and Bruce Voge in Indianapolis.

Prosecutors said the men had been drinking together before Conner stabbed Wentland and struck him with a car then shot Moore and Voge.

Conner, who is 38, was scheduled to be the fourth Indiana Death Row inmate executed by the state this year. Indiana reinstated capital punishment in 1977.

Pro-life supporters planned to peacefully protest Conner’s execution during prayer vigils on July 26 outside the penitentiary in Michigan City, in front of the Governor’s Residence in Indianapolis and near the courthouse in Bloomington.

St. Susanna parishioner Karen Burkhart of Plainfield, the Indiana death penalty abolition coordinator for Amnesty International, said on July 25 that abolitionists throughout the state would mourn Conner’s execution during the solemn vigils in three cities.

“Murder is always wrong and horrifying, whether it is done by an individual or the state,” Burkhart said.

Nick Hess of Indianapolis said recently that he has worked to educate people about “the injustice of the death penalty” for 10 years as a member of the Indiana Information Center on the Abolition of Capital Punishment, a statewide umbrella organization working to end the death penalty.

“The more I learn, the more I’ve considered that the death penalty isn’t compatible with the principles of democracy. I know that there will be a day when Indiana will abolish the death penalty,” Hess said.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church states that life in prison without parole is an acceptable punishment for capital crimes, and that execution is not appropriate in a civilized society because incarceration is an effective way to keep society safe from people convicted of murder. †

 

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