David Dow - The Autobiography of an Execution

When Katya was practicing law, she negotiated settlements with insurance companies. She would quibble over every last dime. When someone knocks on our door asking if we want him to power-wash the exterior of our house, she pays him whatever he asks. It is easier to negotiate on someone else’s behalf. But sometimes it can be hard to separate your own interests from your client’s.

I thought to myself, I will not be begging for my own life. I will be pleading for someone else who ought to live. No one has done that for him. Someone needs to. It is the very least he deserves.

Our drinks came. She raised her glass. I picked up my glass of soda to clink against hers. She nodded to the martini the waiter had also set in front of me and said, Use that one.

She said, What do you want to talk about? I told her I was uncomfortable discussing the case. I had no idea why I was there if I was not going to talk about the case, but there I was. I’d stew over that contradiction later. There were two olives in her drink. She used her thumb and index finger to lift one out. She ate it, then put both fingers in her mouth together to lick off the brine. Under the table her right leg was crossed over her left. She leaned forward. I felt her toes against my shin. She said, I walked here from my office. When I drink too much, I stay the night. I’ve already checked in. Bring your drink and come upstairs with me.

She was wearing a black silk blouse open at the neck and a string of pearls. She tucked a strand of loose hair behind her ear. I wondered whether I would tell Katya. It’s one thing to sleep with someone because you want to. It’s a different thing to sleep with someone because you want them to do something. I once told Katya that I couldn’t sleep with any of the famous people on my list because if I did I wouldn’t know myself anymore, and if I didn’t know myself, I’d have to kill myself. I can’t live with a stranger. She had said, No one knows himself as well as he thinks he does, including you. People surprise themselves all the time.

In college I memorized chunks of Saint Augustine’s Confessions. Future things then are not yet: and if they be not yet, they are not. And if they are not, they cannot be seen . If you could alter history with a minor transgression, wouldn’t you do it? Wouldn’t it be immoral not to?

She signaled the waiter and showed him her room key. She said, Put this on my bill. She stood up and drank down the rest of her martini. She leaned over and her lips were nearly touching my ear. I smelled the gin on her breath. I felt heat coming off her face. I felt her breasts pressing against my shoulder. She said, I think you’ll find it worthwhile. I felt a drop of sweat in my armpit. She whispered, Come on.

I saw Quaker in his cell, sitting on his metal cot, reading. Everything was dark, except for the book, illuminated by the 25-watt bulb of a small gooseneck lamp. I saw the crime scene photographs: Dorris, Daniel, and Charisse, their skin hued yellow, their blood almost black. I saw Lincoln sleeping. I heard Quaker say, In case you’re wondering, I didn’t kill my family.

I said, Judge, I can’t do this.

AVAN BACKED UP to a loading dock at the Polunsky Unit at two o’clock. Half an hour before, guards had led a shackled Quaker to the shower and given him fresh clothes. He felt nothing, neither courage nor fear, neither bitterness nor forgiveness, neither hatred nor love. He could not recall whether he had requested a final meal. He had written his mother a letter and had asked the warden to mail it once it was over. He told her about it when he talked to her on the phone that morning and told her good-bye. She would not be watching him die. He stood under the hottest water he could stand while three guards watched him, their hands resting on holstered cans of Mace they knew they would never need to use. He dressed and walked into the back of the Chevy van. One of the guards said, Inmate Quaker, I hope I see you tomorrow. Quaker nodded, his eyes soft. The other two guards got in the van. The one who had spoken wiped away a tear.

ITALKED TO HENRY just after he arrived at the Walls Unit at four and told him about the vote of the Board. I reminded him that we still had a petition pending in the Supreme Court, but that we all expected it to be denied. I told him that our indications were that Judge Truesdale was going to deny our request for a stay. I didn’t tell him why I was sure of that. He hadn’t said a word. I knew he was still on the line because I could hear electric doors clanging shut in the background. He said, You’ll be here watching tonight, right?

At five o’clock, Judge Truesdale called. She said, You’re not Joan of fucking Arc, you know. I was not sure how to respond to that. She said, I just signed an order withdrawing the date.

I said, Thank you, Judge. She hung up without another word.

The others were in Jerome’s office, discussing whether there was a way to create a legal claim out of the fact that Judge Truesdale had not issued a ruling. I told them she had called. I asked Kassie to call the district attorney’s office to confirm. She said, To confirm? You don’t believe her?

I said, Just call.

Ten minutes later they were standing in my office. Kassie had talked to Shirley in the DA’s office. Shirley believed that Judge Truesdale did not have any legal authority to withdraw the execution date. Under state law, unless a legal action challenging a death sentence is pending in state court, the trial judge cannot issue a stay of execution. The DA’s office interpreted legal action narrowly, and it was true that we had not yet filed a traditional challenge to Quaker’s conviction. Our theory was that we were entitled to gather the evidence to support our claim that he was innocent, and then file a claim based on his actual innocence after we had gathered the evidence. We believed that so long as we were using the judicial process to gather that evidence, which we were, the trial judge could intervene and halt the execution. Kassie explained that to Shirley. Shirley was unimpressed. Shirley told Kassie that the district attorney’s office was going to appeal.

Here’s why I could never be a prosecutor: because I could never be driven to kill someone. I understand death-penalty supporters. I used to be one. I can relate to the retributive impulse. I know people I want to kill. I’ve tried my hardest to save all my clients, but some executions don’t make me cry. There is very little that fire-and-brimstone Bible thumpers and I agree on when it comes to issues of crime and punishment. I believe the world would be better off without religion. But we do have one thing in common: I believe in evil. There are people who commit acts of cruelty so monstrous you have to barricade your senses from contemplating them because if you don’t their images will ruin every pleasure you know. When you are petting your dog, hugging your son, kissing your wife, they will slither in between you and the object of your affection and make you ashamed to be human. That’s why I shower when I get home from the prison and wash my clothes in a load of their own. I have friends who quit doing this work because they couldn’t keep the images from burrowing deep down into their consciousness and stealing all their joy. I doubt the evil men I know were born that way, but maybe some were. Nobody really knows. But I’ll also tell you this: Even the worst people I’ve ever known are sympathetic strapped to a gurney. They’re no longer cruel or evil. Some are repentant, some aren’t. What they all are, at that moment, are helpless, deeply broken men.