The following week, Prejean visits him and his wife. Full
of grief and anguish, they tell her in detail about Faith and her
murder. Faith was planning to join the military on the day she was
kidnapped, raped, and murdered. Eight days passed before her body
was found in the woods. Vernon’s pain nearly overwhelms Prejean.
He describes how he almost killed Robert himself. Robert almost avoided
the death penalty because he was serving life in a federal prison,
so Vernon wrote a letter to his congressman, Bob Livingston, who
gave the letter to President Reagan. Shortly afterward, Reagan called
Vernon and told him that once the Supreme Court turned Robert down,
he would be sent to Louisiana to stand trial.
Analysis
Robert Willie’s role in the brutal rape and murder of
Faith Hathaway, along with his long criminal record and involvement
in two other murders, make him a much less sympathetic person than Patrick
was. Prejean’s doubts and fears about meeting him probably reflect
the readers’ feelings about Robert. As with Patrick, Prejean hears
about Robert’s crime before meeting him. The public finds out about
criminals in the same way, reading about their crimes and later,
perhaps, learning about their lives. Society’s judgment, like Prejean’s,
is cast as soon as the nature of the crime is discovered. Prejean’s
narrative takes on the difficult task of working backward, of building
a sympathetic and complete portrait of a man we have already judged
to be terrifying and evil.
What emerges from Prejean’s initial visits with Robert
is a complex image of a man who is seemingly unrepentant and surprisingly affable.
He is also intelligent, extremely well organized, and gentle. His
evident humanity makes it all the more difficult to reconcile the crime
with the man. Prejean is aware, however, that she cannot let Robert’s
crime recede into the background of her mind. The crime must remain
as evident as his personality and charm, for to allow his good qualities
to overshadow it would be an insult to the victim and her family.
Prejean’s encounter with Vernon and Elizabeth Harvey,
in addition to being one of the most painful experiences in her
life, is the first full portrait of grief in the narrative. It provides
an essential counterpoint to the suffering of the men on death row.
In order to fully consider the damage caused by murder, and therefore
honestly assess the value of capital punishment, the victims’ families
must also be understood. Vernon and Elizabeth Harvey, in all of
their grief and anger, become symbols of victims’ struggles. They
are the other half of Prejean’s narrative. Just as Prejean never
minimizes the suffering of Patrick or Robert, she never minimizes
the Harvey’s overwhelming grief. She also makes it clear that Robert’s
execution won’t heal their pain. Their anger is understandable and
justified, but of limited use.
Until now, Prejean’s faith has been a source of comfort
and support. In this chapter, she acknowledges that same source
of support has also played a role in the world’s long history of
violence. At the heart of Prejean’s religious argument against capital
punishment is her belief in a God who does not seek vengeance. Starting
at that fundamental point, Prejean is able to lay out a religious
argument that is uncompromising in its stance against capital punishment.
