A Life Sentence is a Death Sentence

There are currently twenty-four states that still allow the death penalty in the United States. In 2022, eighteen men were executed. The year prior, eleven were killed. Murdered. Because that’s exactly what it is. A state sanctioned homicide. As I sit here typing, it’s through tears as I cry for the inmates murdered every year that are victims of wrongful convictions and overcriminalization. Whenever I look up statistics and cases, I always get caught going down a rabbit hole and get so angry at the world that we live in and how our country’s justice system and prison system are. Why does no one mourn them? Is it because there is some prejudicial pre-conceived opinion about them? How many of them are innocent? How many of their rights were not recognized and met? Why do so many people preach on forgiveness and then turn around and support a get-back or get-even strategy? How many of them find joy in another’s suffering? How do people still support the erred ways founded by white supremacists that used their power to over criminalize and over punish minorities? Why do we still have states that have private prisons? SO many questions…so here’s another one for you…

Did you know that there’s another death sentence that doesn’t involve planned execution? It isn’t talked about as much with as much seriousness because there’s no dread or looming sense of doom pending execution. But it's simple...being sentenced to life is being sentenced to death without the pre-planned execution date. It is slow and it's agonizing. These inmates are sent to rot and die in a cell like an animal, away from loved ones, without any hope of freedom, without purpose, and with no idea when their day will come, only knowing that this is where they will spend the rest of their lives, forever. They are slowly forgotten by those they once called friends, nothing but a distant memory as someone who now has nothing tangible to offer. Their mental health deteriorates. The world is robbed of what they could have offered like knowledge, talents, love, etc. They are robbed of what their life could have been. If that’s not a death sentence, I don’t know what is.

Elisa Grant - 2/24/2023