Last week the State of Texas got its man. On Wednesday 20th July at 8:53pm Mark Ströman was executed.
For a little over a month, the Reprieve team battled for Mark’s life. Hours after his execution I was unable to sleep. So I checked my time sheets—130 hours in the last two weeks. Overall, we put in over 2,000 hours—50 weeks’ work. It all failed.
Mark killed two people, and tried to kill a third—Rais Bhuiyan, an extraordinary man who joined our battle to prevent the execution, and then led it. Shortly after 9/11, Mark walked into the Dallas store where Rais was working, intent on exacting revenge on “Muslims.” He pointed a shotgun at Rais, asked him where he was from and then, before Rais could reply, pulled the trigger. Rais felt the sting of a million bees, belatedly heard the echo of the blast, and fell to the floor in a pool of blood. He thought his life was over.
Miraculously, it was not. But soon Rais’ second horror began. The surgery to save his life and to try unsuccessfully to save the sight in one eye was complicated and expensive. He had no health insurance. The bills started piling up, and he dreaded the debt collector’s knock. He struggled to maintain his sanity, and his marriage foundered. The prosecutor told him that the decision had been made: Mark should die in the execution chamber. Still in an emotional fug, Rais testified at the trial, aware neither that he was putting Mark on death row, nor that he had the right to object.
Rais wanted to understand what had happened to him. Why? He had heard a little. Mark Ströman’s mother announced she’d rather have had a dog than him, and that she had been only $50 short of an abortion. His stepfather taught Mark white supremacy, and beat him if he did not beat up other kids.
Rais wanted to know more, but the judge told him he could have no contact with the perpetrator. As Mark overcame his drug addiction, and started “habilitating” himself (he had never been taught before), he wanted to apologise to those he had hurt. The prison told him he was allowed no contact with the victims.
Nine years on, Texas decreed that Mark should die on 20th July 2011. A devout Muslim, Rais felt he could stay silent no more, and announced his opposition to the execution, that he said was shared by the widows of Mark’s two other victims.
His timing was good. In the same month, Governor Rick Perry announced Victims’ Rights week. “I encourage all Texans,” said Perry, “to join in this effort by learning more about victims’ rights and supporting victims of crime whenever possible. We can help our fellow Texans on the road to recovery with compassion and respect.”
Rais asked the prison to allow mediation, the opportunity to seek reconciliation—his absolute right under the law. They never replied. Rais asked the pardon board to allow him to address them. They never replied. Rais asked the Governor for a meeting. Perry never replied. In desperation, Rais sued them all. The Governor’s lawyers announced that those hallowed rights were hollow: Rais had “waived” his right to show compassion by failing to act earlier. The federal appellate court expressed the view that Rais’ claim seemed “frivolous.” The Supreme Court criticised him for filing his appeal on the wrong paper.
So Texas killed its man, and Rais had been allowed to meet him only once—immediately prior to the blast of the shotgun.
Rais credits his mother with instilling him with compassion. It is a virtue that most mothers try to teach. Meanwhile the Texas government—for good or ill, the most powerful teacher of all—decided to promote a different lesson. Where did Governor Perry’s mother go so horribly wrong?
Clive Stafford Smith is the director of Reprieve
No reprieve in Texas
July 27, 2011
...
