Families of Death-Row Prisoners Face a Harsh Sentence Themselves

Tarnished Heart

Many people would assert that the kids are better off without their father — whom prosecutors labeled a "heartless killer." But even before Mitchell sought Christ's forgiveness and salvation nine years ago in prison, Theresa had known him since childhood as someone with "a heart of gold." He was the older brother who tried to protect his abused siblings; the husband who brought home a jobless friend so he wouldn't have to sleep in his car.

As Theresa recounts his story, Mitchell was raised by a violent stepfather, who introduced all his children to drugs and alcohol at an early age and sexually molested both the sons and the daughters — often with one of his loaded guns in sight. His sister tried telling others what was happening, but because her mother wouldn't back her up, no one believed the accusations. Mitchell ran away a few times, but always came back to help protect his younger siblings.

At 17 he called the police when he caught his stepdad raping Mitchell's younger sister, but again his mom refused to speak against her husband, who received only the proverbial "slap on the wrist" in the form of probation. Finally Mitchell left to serve in the army, married, and then held a series of jobs, each time working himself up from the bottom to a management position. But all his life his stepdad had treated Mitchell like "worthless trash," says Theresa, "and he'd get to that position and panic that he'd fail." Under pressure — and with the painful memories of abuse — Mitchell started drinking a lot. Then he added drugs. Once he tried to drown himself, until he "came to his senses," says Theresa, and returned home soaked and muddy.

He agreed to go with her once for counseling, but when they overheard the counselor on the phone repeating something Mitchell had unmasked in confidence, Mitchell refused to go again. In 1985 the couple agreed to separate for a time, "because he knew he was going downhill and didn't know how to stop it," says Theresa. "I was really scared. My fear was that he would do something to himself. I never thought he would do what he did." What Mitchell did was hook up with another woman. Then he robbed and killed three Domino's Pizza employees: two in South Carolina, one in California. Mitchell had worked for Domino's. While the police tried to catch Mitchell, Theresa's employer threatened to "let me go," she recalls.

Frightened and angry, Theresa countered that she would sue. "I was pregnant at the time and had the other kids. I had to pay my bills, and I knew nobody else would hire me," she says. "So I had to do whatever I could to keep that job." What's more, the police had frozen her checking account — which she didn't even know until a rent check bounced. "I was so upset," she remembers. "I hadn't done anything wrong."

During Mitchell's trial, she watched sadly as her husband kept his head down. "The media took that to mean he was showing no remorse," Theresa says. "But you've got to remember, his family was not raised to show any emotion. They couldn't afford to. And after you're brought up like that all your life, can people really expect that — all of a sudden and in front of all these cameras and strangers — you're going to show emotion? You hold it in until you're away from everybody else. And he did show remorse, but he didn't do it in the courtroom."

Certain friends urged her to divorce Mitchell; others completely severed ties with her. Financial losses hit the family hard — even the IRS told her if she divorced him they would write off tax penalties that Mitchell had incurred. "But because I stayed married to him, I was being punished for it," she notes, still bewildered. But she would not budge from her commitment. "I love him," she underscores. "If he had abused the children the way he was abused, I would have left. But he was never like that. He did a horrible thing, but we also know a side of him that most people don't get to know . . . I've found out that our love and marriage are strong enough to go through anything. And that's a gift we give our children."

Parenting from Prison

The four children all know that Dad is on death row — and why. He's still very much a part of their lives, offering advice, keeping up on their interests and achievements like oldest son Mike's football prowess or second son Scott's artwork. But most of the hands - on child rearing falls to Theresa, who currently works full time with an organization serving the mentally handicapped. "Sometimes I'm just so tired, and I don't want to go to every football game, and I don't feel like taking Ashley to dancing class," she admits. "But they grow up so fast, and I've got to be there for them. I'll rest when they're grown — I think!" she adds with a chuckle. They don't talk much about the execution, should it ever take place, though Mitchell has finally persuaded Theresa to begin planning for the funeral.

They've talked about hymns; his favorite is "How Great Thou Art." He'll be buried in the cemetery of Laurel Baptist Church in South Congaree, which Theresa and the kids have attended for several years, and which accepted Mitchell into membership after his conversion to Christ in prison. Theresa remembers the night three years ago when Mike, then 15, woke up crying from a nightmare. He had dreamed that the family was visiting Mitchell one last time before his lethal injection. And as the needle pierced his father's skin, Mike could feel the pain shooting up his own arm. "I was holding him, and he just cried and cried," says Theresa mournfully. "He said he could feel everything they were doing to his dad."

As Theresa speaks, she sits on the blue- and-pink flowered couch in her living room, her long brown hair still damp and fragrant from its morning shampoo. The room is filled with images of guardian angels — in pictures on the wall, statuettes on the tables, candleholders on the bookshelf. "Because I know I'm surrounded by angels," she says. In the middle of the family photo wall, she has placed a picture of Jesus — "because He's the head of our house."

She's also hung a framed copy of the "Footprints" poem, reminding her that, in her darkest trials and sufferings, Jesus still carries her. "I put these things there to remember Who gets me through every day." "It's obvious to me that God has His hand on this family and that this family will persevere," says Bob McAlister, a Columbia public relations consultant who ministered to death-row inmates when they were housed at Broad River.

That's where he met Mitchell, who asked Bob to check on Theresa and the children. "His focus has always been on his family," says Bob. "He never asked for a thing for himself" — remarkable in light of the fact that Bob then wielded significant influence as the governor's chief of staff. Theresa met Bob when he and the prison chaplain showed up on her doorstep about 10 years ago, bearing a huge bag of Christmas gifts for her and the children. Later, as Bob and his wife, Carol, kept in close touch, Theresa asked them to be her children's godparents. Bob praises Theresa for her enduring commitment to her family and to Christ. "She's a living validation of the Scriptures," he says, "that if you do the right thing and by faith rely on Christ, you can overcome."

Reckoning with the Past

Jane Knese has also found comfort and strength in her Christian faith as she endures her middle son's death sentence. Convicted of murdering his wife, Lauren *, during a fight four years ago, Randy, 33, just completed his third year at Potosi Correctional Center in Missouri. As with many other mothers of offenders, Jane has suffered both grief and guilt over her possible role in Randy's tragic behavior, aggravated by his drug addiction. "We probably weren't as aware as we should have been," she says of herself and her husband — though Randy's slide into narcotics didn't really pick up speed until after he went away to college. "I have a problem with confrontation, and I'd rather step back instead of correcting a difficult issue."

Jane admits. "We prayed a lot, but maybe didn't do enough of the right things." Randy himself shifts none of the blame to his parents. "But still," adds Jane, "as a parent you do feel guilt. Why didn't we try just one time to take him by the hand and get him some help?" Along with the guilt came anger. "I was angry at both Randy and Lauren," says Jane. "If they were having that much trouble, why didn't they divorce?

Why didn't she get out of his life? Why didn't he get out of hers? Why did it have to come to this? We loved Lauren, and it [her death] was so hard. It still is." But at some point, she adds, you realize that "you can't go back and relive it. So finally we just tried to go on and pray for the future."

No Support Groups

Jane pauses to dab her fingers at the tears skimming down her cheeks. "They won't let you bring Kleenex into this place" — the prison visiting room — she notes. The only things she can bring in are some coins for the vending machine; the prison will provide a deck of cards and a Bible.

But nothing to wipe away the painful tears of seeing a much-loved son bound for execution. "There are no support groups for us" — the hurting parents of the criminals, she adds somberly. "We're not considered victims." Jane visits her son every week, usually alone. "It's hard for his father to come through all these layers of security," she explains.

And there are health concerns, adds Randy. "Three days after I got sentenced, my father had a nervous breakdown, and his health has never been the same since. And that's my fault." Randy's parents aren't the only ones who suffer guilt pains. But through her faithful visits with her son, "we have the best relationship we've ever had," says Jane with a smile. "There's nothing we feel we can't talk about." "My mother is my best friend," adds Randy.

Their shared faith in Christ has strengthened their bond as well. Just as Randy's tragic actions drove him to seek the forgiveness and mercy of Christ, they have also driven his mom to dependence on the Lord's sovereignty and good purpose. She's thankful that Potosi offers the inmates numerous programs and areas of service, and that it allows close contact during visits. She remembers his first year in the more restrictive confines of jail, where a clear partition prevented her from touching her son. "I would kiss my fingers and hold them up to the window," she says. But even at Potosi, "it's forever in the back of our minds where we are," Jane adds. "We're still on death row."

Interesting, how she says we. Randy's punishment is a family punishment. "That's where we fall on our faith, knowing that there's something more than this human life that we're experiencing. Randy has a spiritual life, and they can't take that away from him." Nevertheless, she continues, "we pray and hope that something can be changed" — that the next stage of appeals will turn in Randy's favor; that a future court will determine the killing was not premeditated and therefore doesn't warrant death; that the Missouri legislature or governor or someone will put an end to executions altogether.

As a Catholic, Jane adheres to a pro-life conviction that opposes the death penalty as firmly as it opposes abortion. But she admits that the issue "wasn't brought to the forefront of my mind until this happened to our own family." Then, in January 1999, a plea from visiting Pope Paul II persuaded Missouri Gov. Mel Carnahan to halt the scheduled execution of another Potosi inmate, commuting his sentence to life imprisonment.

Since then Jane has joined with other women in her Bible study to write to their legislative representatives, urging them to rethink — and rescind — the legitimacy of the death penalty. She lists some of the common reasons: the inconsistency and unfairness of the death penalty's application; its failure as a deterrent to crime . . . But then she brings it back to the personal. "Those people on the outside" — the ones who clamor for death, the ones swayed by the limited, dramatized news reports — "they don't know Randy," she stresses. "They don't have a picture of who he really is."

Seeing a Different Side

Paula Skillicorn knows firsthand that news reports don't give the whole story. She was a news reporter herself for 15 years, most recently for the Kansas City Star, covering the courts and crimes of Missouri. Her tenacity and police connections made her privy to much "off the record" information concealed from the general public and often even the crime victims' families.

On the other hand, as her post-trial research uncovered, authorities involved in homicide cases sometimes outright lied to her, she says. For print "we were given the information needed to portray [the suspects] as cold-blooded killers, completely bad news." For the most part, Paula accepted those portrayals herself. "I believed in the death penalty, because I thought, as most people do, that only the most heinous crimes get that punishment. Only the people who are psychopaths, completely irredeemable, get the death penalty." Paula held no biblical convictions concerning the death penalty, because, frankly, she didn't believe in God. "I was an atheist for 30 years and quite comfortable in my beliefs," she claims. But both of those beliefs — concerning God and death-row criminals — capsized after she met

Dennis Skillicorn, convicted of first-degree murder (still under appeal). She covered his own case as well as interviewed him for an in-depth article on drugs. Over many months, with a reporter's penchant to question and challenge, she doggedly researched his life, probed his professions of faith, scrutinized his remorse for his terrible crimes. And eventually her inspection convinced her that Dennis's transformation, and the God who transformed him, were clearly real. Paula, too, acknowledged Christ as Savior and Lord. As their love for each other grew, both Dennis and Paula grappled with the decision to wed. "On the surface, it didn't seem to make a lot of sense," she says. Both knew the risks of how others would treat Paula if she married a convicted felon.

Paula realized that in a few years Dennis could be ripped from her life through execution. "But I very much like the person I've become with Dennis," says Paula. "He is truly the finest man I've met. And why give up the happiness we have together because of what might happen in the future?" But after their in-prison wedding in 1997, the predicted risks came true. Paula lost her job with the Star; even long-time friends suddenly cut her off. "They didn't bother to ask why I had married Dennis; they just assumed I had traded in my integrity and intelligence."

The new family also included a child: Paula's son Regi, seven years old when they married. He, too, had gotten to know Dennis and why he was in prison. "Dennis is very open with him about the bad decisions he made throughout his life, the consequences of using drugs and hanging around with the wrong people," says Paula. Now 10, "Regi has an incredible sense of integrity and of right and wrong. And I think that has a lot to do with Dennis."

Paula, too, has never sugarcoated Dennis's past for Regi. "He did wrong behaviors" that inflicted great suffering on others, she told her son. "But the fact that he is sorry for that and has turned his life around is something to be proud of." And as father and stepson have spent time together during prison visits and in the prison's 4-H Club, "they've gotten really close," adds Paula. Strong opposition to the death penalty has supplanted Paula's former support.

Now she believes that it cruelly inflicts stress on the victims' families — forcing them to relive the traumatic events of the crime through each appeal and resurgence of publicity. But it also creates another set of victims, she says — the family members of the prisoner. "I made a choice" — to enter into a death-row relationship, she points out.

"Most of these families did not. Most of these families are good people who did nothing wrong, and yet they have been condemned right along with the person they love. "If you want to sentence my husband to life in prison, that's a natural consequence, and we will have to deal with that," she adds. "But it isn't right to sentence us to death — and that's what this is."

* Starred names have been changed