Forgiveness and Capital Punishment

Broadly speaking, restorative justice can never be more than a partway measure to curtail violence, social-justice advocates argue, because, just like traditional prosecution, it happens after the fact. To eliminate the harm that we do to one another, they say, would require national investment in alleviating generational poverty often born of racial segregation and expanding mental-health and drug-addiction treatment, among other things. As Rachel Liles put it, “Restorative justice? Let’s have a country that doesn’t make an Adam Lawson in the first place.”

They Agreed to Meet Their Mother’s Murderer. Than Tragedy Struck Again, by Eli Hager at The Marshall Project.