Dead Man Walking Inhumane

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Pages: 7

Dead Man Walking was written by a nun called Helen Prejean, who had a spiritual revelation and wanted to help the poor. She became pen pals with a death row inmate at Angola, Elmo Patrick Sonnier. Inmate Sonnier was born in St. Martinsville, Louisiana. Which was not a nice town. She wasn’t surprised that he was in prison considering where he grew up. He was charged with the death of two teenagers and the rape of one. As, Sister Helen begins writing to him she starts to believe he is innocent of the crimes. She tries to help him fight his case with the help of attorney Millard Farmer. Although the parole board had never granted Patrick parole. Sister Helen became an advocate against the death penalty and tries to fight against it with hiring …show more content…
I do not understand the court’s decision when Eddie himself confessed to committing the entire crime and Patrick was only there to help his young brother. Patrick did rape the girl, but the gun was in eddies hand. Sister Helen states, “At Patrick’s second sentencing trial, Eddie, declaring, “I want to tell the truth and get everything off my chest” Testifying it was he who had killed the teenagers…” (“Dead Man Walking” p.16). Eddie confessed to pulling the trigger and murdering the two young lovers. Yes, Patrick was involved and an accomplice, but was not the mastermind behind the killing they both should have received life sentences. If the family was trying for a death penalty case, then Eddie should have been the one of death row not Patrick. Also, I do not agree with the supreme court decision to uphold that “…death by electricity was not cruel and unusual punishment…” (“Dead Man Walking” p.18). When in some cases it took up to twenty minutes for an inmate to die because of the electrodes bursting and falling off. It was an extremely slow and agonizing death for inmates. Another topic I disagreed with was the fact that the priests at the prison were trying to prevent the nuns from providing spiritual guidance. The priests preventing them because they threatened their power and would possibly become obsolete. They blamed it on the fact that women were too emotionally involved and caused countless problems due to