A Book of American Martyrs(115)

Death Row.

Sentenced to death.

Lethal injection.

They avoided speaking of these matters. Even Luke.

To allude to the situation at all you might say the Trouble.

As in, before the Trouble. Or, after the Trouble.

Though it was not clear if the Trouble meant their father shooting the men at the Women’s Center, or only just their father being arrested and incarcerated; or whether the Trouble meant specifically the second trial, the verdict and the terrible sentence.

Two counts of homicide, first degree.

Condemned to death.

Appeal pending.

Definitely, there was hope in this appeal! A team of lawyers experienced in death penalty law were now involved in the case as well as Luther’s original public defender.

They were arguing not guilty by reason of (temporary) insanity.

Or were they arguing not guilty by reason of insanity.

(Luther Dunphy angrily refused to accept this defense strategy. But by a technicality some variant of the defense could be argued in a presentation to the Ohio State Court of Appeals with which the defendant was not required to concur.)

Among the Dunphys no one believed that the execution would ever really take place for the Republican governor of Ohio could commute Luther Dunphy’s sentence to life imprisonment if he wished and it was known that petitions were being sent to the governor by politicians supportive of the Right-to-Life cause as well as by Christian congregations in Ohio and the Midwest. It was believed too that a wealthy Ohio manufacturer was exerting pressure on the governor whose campaign he’d helped finance—the man’s name was “Bear” or “Beard”—Dawn had heard . . . Edna Mae did not like to speak of such matters because it made her anxious to be “hopeful” but Dawn wanted to know as much as she could for she wanted to have hope.

In fact there had been good news. Luther’s lawyer had called one day with good news.

The execution scheduled for April 16, 2002, had been rescheduled for October 29, 2002.

And there was a “strong probability” that the execution would be rescheduled again, to give the appeals team the opportunity to argue their case to the Court.

Each night Dawn X’d out another day on the calendar she kept hidden in a bureau drawer in her bedroom. Each morning noting how many days to October 29 . . .

It will not really happen, Jesus will intervene.

We know this. We have faith.

Edna Mae would have been upset if she’d seen Dawn’s calendar in which October 29 was marked with an ink-black cross. Even Mary Kay might have been upset.

So long as Luther Dunphy was alive, there was hope.

Luther was incarcerated in the Chillicothe State Correctional Institution in Chillicothe, Ohio. It was in Death Row he was incarcerated—the actual name of the unit was Death Row.

It was not so easy to visit Luther now, for Chillicothe was a three-hour drive from Mad River Junction. The detention facility at Muskegee Falls had been less than twenty miles away.

Visits had become difficult for other reasons as well. Edna Mae was so often unwell—and Luke was not always available to drive. And once, when they’d made the trip, Luke driving Mary Kay’s car that rattled and jolted on the interstate, Edna Mae in the front seat and Dawn and the younger children crammed into the rear, it was to discover that Luther Dunphy was himself unwell, suffering from some kind of “flu” that prevented him from seeing visitors. Another time, it was to discover that all of Chillicothe was in lockdown after the attempted stabbing of a prison guard.

“Your father knows that we are thinking of him and praying for him. Maybe that is enough for now”—so Edna Mae told them, with a brave smile.


LATE MARCH 2002. “Mud time”—so called in Mad River Junction, Ohio.

Melting snow, ice. Dripping roofs. Tall snowbanks slow-melting draining into gutters, ditches. Glistening pavement, puddles. Swaths of mud in fields and beside walkways. Everywhere the debris of winter—shattered tree limbs, rotted leaves, skeletons of Christmas trees abandoned in vacant lots, shredded papers, plastic. The sun shone brightly and fiercely at midday then began to fade by afternoon. The air turned cold and smelled of something metallic that made Dawn’s nostrils pinch.

She was fifteen years old. She was repeating ninth grade.

For a few weeks that winter she’d played basketball on the girls’ high school team. It had happened like a miracle, so suddenly. There’d been a vogue of Dawn Dunphy—She’s not so bad. She’s kind of shy actually. Too bad she smells when she gets excited. Dawn Dunphy had not been the fastest player on the girls’ basketball team nor had she been the most skilled player but she’d been the most reliable player, the strongest and one of the tallest at five feet eight inches, 147 pounds; she’d been the most indefatigable player capable of playing a full game without a break, panting, frankly sweating, in a glow of perspiration in her dark green uniform and always willing to pass the ball to those girls who could sink baskets far better than she could—A fantastic team player, Dawn Dunphy. If she didn’t run you down like a horse.

Just once, Dawn Dunphy had been so conspicuously tripped to the floor by a player on the opposing team that the referee had declared a foul; Dawn was given two foul shots—both of which she’d missed.

But applause in the gym had been deafening along with cheers, cries, foot-stamping. Dun-phy! Dun-phy! Enthusiasm for ruddy-faced Dawn Dunphy with her thick, muscled, dark-haired legs solid as a man’s legs was laced with laughter but it was good-natured laughter, Dawn was sure. It was not mean.