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Crime victims’ families endure long process
Published November 15, 2009
As the man convicted of killing her sister started to die, Carolyn Barrett could think about only one thing.
“I was thinking he was a coward because he couldn’t even make eye contact,” Barrett said.
Barrett watched Gary Wayne Etheridge, 38, die by lethal injection in August 2002. He was convicted of raping and killing her sister, Christie Chauviere, 15, then stabbing her mother, Gail Chauviere, while he robbed their Tamarind Woods home near Richwood on Feb. 2, 1990.
Gail Chauviere survived to testify against Etheridge. She died a few years before his execution, having contracted liver disease through blood transfusions after the attack.
Barrett said her feelings haven’t changed much since she watched her sister’s murderer die that day at the Walls Unit in Huntsville.
“I’m thankful he can’t do it again,” said Barrett, of Waco. “That’s the main thing.”
Barrett talked about her sister’s killer as Brazoria County District Attorney prosecutors are in the midst of pursuing the death penalty against Nicholas-Michael Jean, 22, of Pearland. Jean faces a capital murder charge in the shooting death of Susana DeJesus, who was kidnapped from a Pearland shopping center parking lot Feb. 2, which coincidentally was the 19th anniversary of Christie Chauviere’s murder.
A PAINFUL PROCESS
The Jean case is only the fourth capital murder case in 20 years where prosecutors are seeking the death penalty. If he is convicted, DeJesus’ family faces many years of a long, frustrating legal process.
The legal process in a death penalty case, including appeals and stays leading up to an execution, can be grueling for the families of the victims, officials said.
“The hardest part is you don’t have any control,” said Sharon Couch, Brazoria County crime victims coordinator.
Couch became a crime victims coordinator after her granddaughter, Renee Goode, was killed in 1994 at age 2. A pathologist could not determine the cause of the girl’s death. Couch fought with others to exhume Goode’s body, and two pathologists later ruled Goode’s death a homicide.
Renee’s father eventually was convicted of capital murder and received a life sentence.
Helping Susana DeJesus’s family through the trial process, Couch said she remembers how frustrated she felt not understanding the hearings and legal rulings before the trial.
“You can’t even breathe because you are so focused,” she said. “It consumes you.”
Once convicted and sentenced to die, it can take several years to reach execution. That only lengthens the frustration for most relatives, said Mark Odom, deputy director of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice’s victims services division.
“Most of them say they are disappointed at how long the process takes,” he said.
Etheridge had been scheduled to die at least twice before his execution took place. Reprieves postponed execution dates in 2000 and in 2002. The legal battles took their toll on Christie and Gail Chauviere’s loved ones, Barrett said.
“It’s extremely drawn out,” Barrett said. “When you become a victim, you lose all of your rights.”
EXECUTION AND BEYOND
Odom said once the execution approaches after years of legal battles, it isn’t really known how the victims’ relatives deal with the event. While many relatives seek help and counseling through the process, there are not a lot of requests for help after it, Odom said.
“The actual execution can be traumatic,” he said.
Odom said there is not a lot of research available about how the actual execution affects victims’ family members.
One study of death penalty survivors, however, reveals many do not believe the execution provides them any closure, according to an article in the 2007 Marquette University Law Review.
“They abhor the word because it implies ‘getting over it,’” the authors state.
That’s largely because even though a condemned person might finally see justice, the victims’ families have to continue living with their loss, Couch said.
“There’s not closure,” she said. “You’re just not ever over it.”
For Barrett, she said she doesn’t feel regret about Etheridge’s death, and she might never find a way to forgive.
“My mother had that kind of strength, but I don’t,” she said. “I pray for the strength to forgive.”
John Tompkins covers Brazoria County courts for The Facts. Contact him at 979-849-8581.
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