bout de papier, Vol. 16, No. 3 (1999) — Fall 1999 // Automne 1999, pp. 3–7
by John Morrow
They say that when you gaze into the looked through the wired glass of the busiest Death Row in the western world for the first time on July 10th, 1998, I had no way of knowing where that meeting would take me. My Consular Officer, Agnes Black, and I had made the long drive to the Ellis I Unit, which houses Death Row. On the other side of the glass from me, his gray hair cropped short, was Joseph Stanley Faulder. To be honest, based on what I knew of the case, I expected to find a monster.
As the three of us sat and he talked with Agnes about the latest news from his family and the state of his case, I was struck by the fact that unlike almost every other prisoner I have visited, he had not one complaint or concern about himself. He worried about his family, and he displayed a wry sense of humour that was surprising in such a place. By the time we were set to leave, I found myself grudgingly admitting that I liked him. As I stood to go, I put my hand on the glass and he pressed his to the other side — the standard greeting on Death Row, where physical contact with inmates is never allowed — and I looked into his eyes as he had into mine. I told him that I would do everything I could for him. He held my gaze and nodded, and we left to return to Dallas.
When I met with Stan that first time, he did not have an execution date set. Shortly after that visit, on September 16th, 1998, the Court of Criminal Appeals vacated the stay of execution and set a new date — December 10th, 1998. During the next few months I visited Stan several times. He did not open up to people easily, but I think he saw that I honestly wanted to help him, and, more importantly to him, to help his family, and we became friends.
Like many Foreign Service officers, my work has often called me to deal with death in the abstract. When I worked as an intelligence analyst I became quite used to writing factual, emotionless briefs on the casualties in the latest bus bombing or refugee camp shelling. Now, this professional detachment was slowly wearing away, and each time I sat across the glass from Stan Faulder, the harder it was not to see and begin to empathize with another human being, however imperfect he might have been.
My role over these months, in addition to occasional visits to the prison, was primarily one of liaison with the State of Texas. I had developed good relationships with many senior members of the Governor’s office and other agencies through my other political and economic policy work, and I worked these contacts quite hard in order to ensure that Stan’s case got the full attention of the Texas justice system. I met with the Chairman of the Board of Pardons and Paroles as well as with Governor Bush’s legal advisors. Although many of these individuals expressed misgivings about some aspects of the prosecution or punishment, there was little that most of them could do under the laws and procedures governing the death penalty in Texas.
I forget exactly when the question of my attending the execution as a witness was raised. Stan had very clearly forbidden any family members to attend, and at one point did not want even his lawyer to be there. However, Sandra Babcock is as determined and dedicated a person as I have ever met, and there was no way that she was going to let Stan go alone. Stan often spoke to me about being worried about Sandra’s being there by herself, and at some point in response to that I asked if he wanted me to accompany her. He was very grateful that she would not be alone, and although he never said it in so many words, I think he was relieved that he would not be alone either. I understand that when the issue was raised with senior management, in the context of “would this be appropriate”, it was decided that it would indeed be appropriate but that the final decision would be mine. I must confess though that I agreed to attend less out of a sense of duty to the Department than from a sense of duty to Stan’s family, to Sandra, and to Stan himself.
By the time December 10th arrived, the Faulder case had ceased to be a quiet, diplomatic effort and had burst upon the pages of Canadian and U.S. newspapers and onto the airwaves of television and radio. We provided press releases and background information to news organizations from both countries, and we considered it quite a coup when several large Texas papers, most notably the Dallas Morning News, published editorials calling for Stan’s death sentence to be commuted to life imprisonment, based largely on the various irregularities that they saw in the legal process in his case.
I had continued my frequent visits and calls to Austin, making our case to anyone who would listen in the state capital, but I was not surprised when the Board of Pardons and Paroles denied clemency. I always made sure in my dealings with Texas officials that they understood that our concerns were based on humanitarian grounds and were not an attack on the justice system in Texas. That being said, I was still disappointed, because I felt, and still feel, that there were numerous factors in the Faulder case that did in fact make a compelling argument for clemency. The fact is, however, that Texas virtually never grants clemency in death penalty cases.
On the morning of the scheduled execution we were all reasonably optimistic. Stan’s lawyer had gotten a stay of execution, though it was not expected to outlive a morning appeal, and she was quite confident that the U.S. Supreme Court would also rule in Stan’s favour later in the day. When I saw Stan that morning, he was visiting with his niece and a family friend, and though the mood was tense, we all felt some optimism about the final outcome. I warned him though that the day would proceed as though the execution was a go. Texas prison officials wanted to be in a position to proceed at 18:00 if the stay was lifted and other appeals failed. This meant that they would be coming to get him from Death Row at approximately noon and he would be transported to “The Walls”., the oldest prison in Texas and home of the Death House. Stan would then be kept in a holding cell near the execution chamber. Later in the afternoon, he would have a last visit with his spiritual advisor and then with his lawyer.
Not wanting to intrude too long on his time with family, I stayed about 40 minutes and then got up to leave. The last thing I said to Stan Faulder was “T’ll see you in the morning”, to which he replied with a grin and a “thumbs up”. “. I drove back to Huntsville feeling reasonably cheerful. Stan’s own apparent ease with events made me feel better about his situation.
Later that day, the stay was lifted and the execution became a real possibility. At 15:00 I had to go to the “Hospitality House”. This was a house set aside for the families of inmates scheduled to be executed, where I was required to attend a briefing on the execution process. The prison chaplain explained in horrific detail the carefully scripted way in which the procedure would be carried out. He warned me about the way in which the condemned could be expected to “convulse” and/or “groan” as the second of the three chemicals took effect. He assured me that this was all a subconscious reaction because the first chemical would put the inmate to sleep and he wouldn’t feel anything. I wondered briefly how he knew that. He told me that Stan would be able to see us in the witness room. “It’s okay to wave,” he said. The whole experience was just a little surreal.
At 16:00 I met Sandra just before she went into the prison to see Stan, possibly for the last time. We were both very tense but she was adamant that the Supreme Court would stay the execution. It was considering an appeal based upon various aspects of alleged prosecutorial misconduct, such as the withholding of evidence, the nature of the “private” prosecution, and so forth, as well as on a brief from the Canadian government regarding the clear violation of the Vienna Convention.
I wanted to share her conviction, but as the clocked ticked ever closer to 18:00, I began to wonder.
While Sandra was inside with Stan, I waited for her across the street in the local Dairy Queen, staring out at the dozens of reporters gathered near the prison. The gaudy “Merry Christmas” banners on the prison wall and the radio playing “T’1l be home for Christmas” left me feeling like a visitor from another planet. When Sandra returned we made our way to the prison administration building where all witnesses had to report by 17:00. We were waiting in a holding area while the prison officials awaited word from the Supreme Court. The execution could not go ahead until they received word that the final petition had either been granted or declined.
We waited for the call, a sense of desperation tainting our now-forced optimism. Then, at around 17:45, in a scene straight out of a Hollywood film, the phone on the wall rang and the guard captain answered it. The Supreme Court had granted a stay of execution to consider Stan’s appeal. Just like that, it was all over.
When we left the prison I think we all felt that when the Supreme Court looked in more depth at Stan’s case, they would have to recognize the serious problems that existed in the way the case had been handled. At that moment, we all believed that Stan Faulder would get a new trial, or at the very least have his sentence re-examined and reduced to one of life imprisonment.
When I saw Stan the next morning, he was emotionally and physically drained. He looked worse than I had ever seen him. For the ninth time, he had faced execution and this time had literally been sitting a few feet from the death chamber, within minutes of his scheduled time, when the reprieve had come through. Whatever one might think of the death penalty, I firmly believe that the torture Stan Faulder went through that night is something no one should ever have to face. I cannot begin to fathom the terror that he must have felt, sitting there alone, waiting.
Stan had always joked with me about visiting him in a business suit and tie. I always told him that his prison had a uniform and so did mine, and we had something of a tradition of laughing about it. On this day, to celebrate his still being alive, I arrived to see him in blue jeans and a brown leather jacket, and as soon as he saw me he burst out laughing, much to the displeasure of the guards. We talked at some length, and then his niece and friend arrived to see him, so I quietly said my goodbyes and headed back to Dallas. Mission accomplished, or so I thought.
My optimism lasted until January 25th, 1999, when we learned that the U.S. Supreme Court had decided not to grant Stan’s petition and had lifted the stay of execution. They did so without commenting on the merits of the case, and I found it odd that a man’s execution could be halted and then rescheduled without the least comment on why either action was taken. A new execution date, June 17th, 1999, was set.
At this point, I became convinced that this time Stan Faulder was going to die. The appeal that had failed at the Supreme Court had been, in my opinion, fairly strong, with plenty of solid issues that might have been worthy of review and redress. I was not confident that whatever remaining issues his lawyer could find would be as strong or as compelling as those the court had already rejected.
However, Sandra Babcock is one of the most tenacious and innovative lawyers I have ever met, and she poked and prodded and delved into areas of the law that had never before been raised in a capital case. She was a whirlwind of lawsuit filing and her devotion to the case was untiring and unbending. Whenever I was feeling discouraged, I’d call her and some of her boundless enthusiasm would rub off on me.
I was busy as well, returning to the state capital, meeting officials, lawyers, law enforcement officers, and anyone else who might have the slightest interest in the case. It was a challenging task to deliver the message diplomatically to the Governor that Canada was not happy with the treatment of one of its citizens, while at the same time preserving an important bilateral relationship. As I dealt repeatedly with the Texas officials who would be key to the case, I think they came to respect the efforts that we were making. One senior official went so far as to say that he was impressed by the Canadian government’s resolve and that he hoped the U.S. government would do as much for an American citizen. None of this, of course, meant that they were any less determined to see Stan Faulder executed.
The days leading up to the execution passed in a blur, and on June 15th I returned to Huntsville. The media was out in full force and the decision had been taken in Ottawa that I should give interviews to anyone who wanted one, in an effort to portray a little of the human side of the issue. Since I was one of the only people who would be seeing and speaking to Stan over the next few days, and there was a tremendous amount of interest in his state of mind, I ended up fielding most of those questions. I must say that the reporters I dealt with were very professional and I was treated very well by all of them.
On the morning of the 16th, I went into the prison to see Stan, along with Linden Molntyre from the CBC, who had become quite a close friend of Stan’s following a story the Fifth Estate did on the case. Our conversation was surprisingly lighthearted, with none of us really wanting to dwell on the next day. We talked about the Stanley Cup playoffs, and Stan talked about his past a little and his concerns about how his execution would affect his family. In many ways, I was more nervous than he was. I couldn’t stay long, as I had a number of interviews scheduled, so after about an hour I said my goodbyes, promising to return the next morning.
I spent the rest of the day either on the phone or in front of a microphone. Most of the interviewers wanted to know how Stan was feeling and how it felt to talk to someone so close to death. I did not have good answers to either of those questions, and when I see tapes of those interviews now, I wish I could have more eloquently conveyed both the surreal nature of my visits to the Row, and my frank admiration for the way in which Stan was handling the situation. The quiet dignity with which he was facing death was remarkable, and though I’m certain he was terrified of what might happen, he kept it to himself.
After I had spent a restless night, the morning of the scheduled execution arrived and I tried to prepare myself for whatever might come. I arrived at the prison at approximately 09:00, and again Linden McIntyre and I visited with Stan. Stan had asked us to finish up by about 10:30 because he wanted a chance to return to his “house” and take care of some final arrangements before the guards came to take him to The Walls. This visit was unlike any other I had ever had with Stan. He knew that all but his very last appeal had been denied and while he clearly did not want to die, and was in fact very afraid, he was also calm and at peace like no one I have ever known.
The ninety minutes I spent on the Row that day were among the most genuine moments of my life. Every time another Death Row inmate walked by on his way to his own visitor, he would knock on the cage and wish Stan good luck. We spoke very intimately, and I feel compelled to respect the privacy that Stan always sought with regard to most of our conversation, but there was one moment that moved me almost to tears. Towards the end of the visit, an elderly man, a volunteer chaplain, approached Stan from our side of the glass. They knew each other well and after a few moments of lighthearted greetings Stan told the chaplain that he might “be going home today”. As they pressed their hands to the glass, the chaplain thanked Stan, whom he had known for many years, for being “a blessing in my life”. The unconditional love and compassion that flowed between these two men, in so terrible a place, was almost a physical force.
Shortly after that, the time came for us to take our leave. I really didn’t know what to say as we got up to go. What could you possibly say to someone who is eight hours away from dying? He asked me to look after Sandra when it came time for the execution and I told him again, as I had in December, that I would see him in the morning. He laughed again, but not like he had in December. This time, it was a resigned laugh, and clearly neither of us believed it.
I spent most of the rest of the day with the media, talking about my visit and the prospects for another last minute reprieve. It was clear that unless the Supreme Court stepped in once more, the execution would go ahead at 18:00. Again I waited across the street from the prison, in the same Dairy Queen as before, this time with a small group of Stan’s supporters, until Sandra returned from her last visit just after 16:30 and told us she had just heard that the last appeal was denied. The execution would proceed.
The cold realization that this time there would be no euphoric reprieve sank in. In just over ninety minutes, Stan Faulder would die. We all made some calls, Sandra to her husband and I to the Consular office in Ottawa to alert them that the execution would definitely proceed. In no time it was 17:00 and Sandra and I walked across to the administration building, from where we would be led to the Death House. We spent the next hour in quiet contemplation, neither of us having much to say. When the guards came at 18:00, I took a deep breath.
We walked across the street, past the assembled media, and we were buzzed through the gates of The Walls. We joined the media witnesses in a holding area, while the guards escorted the witnesses from the victim’s family into the Death House. Everything ran like a well-oiled machine, with great pains being taken to ensure that the witnesses from both families never encountered each other. The walk to the Death House felt like it was about 100 miles, and I just set one foot in front of the other, trying not to think too much.
There are two metal doors on the outside of the House, and inside one of them the victim’s family were already gathered. The other door was unlocked and we stepped into our own viewing area, a very small room not much bigger than a closet with a large glass window at one end. Through that window, strapped onto a gurney with his arms outstretched, lay Stan Faulder. He had been looking at our window, as though waiting for us, and as soon as he saw us he nodded once in our direction and then looked up at the ceiling. The warden asked if he had a final statement, and he indicated that he did not. Sandra and I stood together, our hands pressed to the glass.
The next few minutes will never fade from my memory. Suffice to say that it was even worse than I had imagined. Stan Faulder was officially declared dead at 18:18. We returned to the Administration building and then went out to make our formal statements to the media. I am still amazed that I managed to stand before all of those cameras and people and more or less calmly say my piece. I was pretty much on autopilot at that point.
I knew Stan Faulder for less than a year. During that time I went from wondering what kind of monster he might be to being deeply moved by the humanity of the man. I have never made any excuses for Stan, and he never made any to me. I have never been able to adequately explain what there was about the man that allowed me to look beyond the brutal facts of his case. I was impressed by his concern for his family, for other inmates, and for those of us working on his case, by his deep spiritual beliets, his honest and self-critical sense of humour, and by a profound remorse that convinced me that he was punishing himself far beyond what Texas could do to him.
A few days after the execution, I sent a message to those in DFAIT who had worked so long and so hard on the case. In it I said:
Though some in Canada might disagree, I feel that our involvement in this case, from Minister Axworthy’s personal interventions on down to the most mundane of our tasks, was not only appropriate but indeed was imperative. If one can judge the social justness of a society by the way in which it treats or supports its least fortunate or least sympathetic citizens, then I think the Faulder case speaks volumes of the moral character of Canada and Canadians. When we start to pick and choose whose rights we will defend, I believe we start down a dark path from which there is no certain exit.
Stan Faulder was deeply moved by the renewed closeness he found with his family, something he thought he had lost forever, and by the concern of countless people in Canada and the U.S., something he never expected. Whatever else he may have been, the quiet dignity with which he repeatedly faced a horrible death proved to me that Stan Faulder was the bravest soul I’ve ever known. He was convicted of a terrible crime, and I never forgot that, but after walking with Stan through the last year of his life, right up to death’s door itself, I cannot find anything but compassion for him in my heart. I tried to conduct myself as professionally as possible, and to represent the government and the country as well as I knew how, through a unique and unimaginable process. I am not ashamed to have called Stan Faulder my friend and I hope that I made his final days and minutes just a little easier.
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Originally published in bout de papier, Vol. 16, No. 3 (1999) — Fall 1999 // Automne 1999, pp. 3–7. Read the rest of this issue →
