Dead Man Walking: The US nun who took on the death penalty

Lives Less Ordinary

BBC

Society & Culture, Documentary, Personal Journals

4.6 • 814 Ratings

🗓️ 7 July 2024

⏱️ 46 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

When Sister Helen Prejean agreed to write to a convicted murderer on Louisiana’s death row in 1982, she had no idea what was coming. She would end up becoming his spiritual advisor, eventually accompanying him to his execution two years later. The experience changed her profoundly. She wrote a book about what she'd witnessed on death row, Dead Man Walking, which was turned into a major Hollywood movie in 1995. Forty years later, she has witnessed six more state executions - and is still tirelessly fighting to end them.

Presenter: Jo Fidgen Producer: Zoe Gelber

Get in touch: [email protected] or WhatsApp: 0044 330 678 2784

Transcript

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0:00.0	On a winter's night in 1974, a crime took place that would obsess the nation.
0:06.9	It was an extraordinary news story.
0:09.1	The story of an aristocrat, Lord Lucan, who's said to have killed the family Nanny,
0:13.7	mistaking her for his wife, then somehow just disappeared.
0:18.0	One of the great mysteries in English criminal history.
0:20.7	We're still looking for Lucan.
0:22.1	It's honestly one of the most powerful stories of my lifetime.
0:25.9	I'm Alex von Tundselman.
0:27.3	This is The Lucan Obsession.
0:29.2	Listen on BBC Sounds.
0:35.3	It was the first time I had ever addressed an envelope on a letter that gave us the address,
0:42.4	death row.
0:44.5	And I wrote him a letter.
0:46.6	We don't know each other yet, but I'd love to be a pen pal and write letters to you.
0:51.4	I can't send you money, but I can be your friend.
0:56.5	When Sister Helen Prejean agreed to correspond with a convicted murderer on death row in Louisiana,
1:03.4	she didn't know what she was letting herself in for.
1:06.8	And right away, boy, the letter came back,
1:13.1	well, I'm a Catholic and you're a nun.
1:15.1	Would you be my spiritual advisor?
1:19.1	And I say, yes, I fill out the form, spiritual advisor.
1:24.9	What she witnessed behind some of the most heavily guarded doors in the United States turned her life upside down.
	...

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