Ask Me for Forgiveness

A guard escorted me through the halls of a South Texas prison to a unit called Administrative Segregation, or Ad Seg. Ad Seg is like a prison within a prison, reserved for confirmed prison gang members and offenders who have committed crimes in prison. I was there to meet with Marcus. It was my second meeting with him as a part of the Victim-Offender Mediation Dialogue program, where I volunteer as a mediator. He agreed to meet with the mother of the woman he murdered. Any offender participating in the VOMD process must take responsibility for his or her crime. Marcus had done just that. He readily admitted killing Mallory, Karen’s daughter. It was a drug deal gone bad. Marcus was only nineteen when he murdered Mallory. At that time, he was a member of the prison gang, the Texas Syndicate. Mallory was not in the gang; she just lived down the street from Marcus and bought marijuana from him to sell to her friends in college. There was some mix-up with money, and Mallory refused to fix it. So, the gang leaders told Marcus to take care of the situation, in other words, kill her.

So he went to her house and pretended to be there just to get high with her. When she walked into her bedroom to get something, he followed her and shot her in the back of the head. He gathered up the drugs and money and left. When he reported back to the gang, they asked if he had cleaned up the place. He had not, so he went back the next day to do so. I asked him where the victim was when he went back to clean up, and he said, “She was lying on the floor, where I shot her.” I asked him how he felt when he went back into the room and had to walk around her body. He shrugged and said, “I didn’t feel anything.”

I paused for a minute, then asked, “How do you feel right now telling me about it?” He answered quietly, “I guess it makes me sound like a cold-blooded killer.” In that moment, for the first and only time, his demeanor shifted—he looked away briefly, and his voice softened. In all our other conversations, he was open and direct, showing no emotional affect at all during the months we prepared for the meeting.

Karen, on the other hand, was very emotional. She easily wept over the loss of her daughter. She was a woman of great faith. She told me at our first meeting that she had forgiven Marcus early on. Within days of learning who was responsible for Karen’s murder, she forgave. And when she was given the opportunity to speak in court, delivering her victim impact statement before Marcus’ sentencing, she looked right at him and told him she forgave him.

After several months of preparation, the day of the actual mediation arrived. Since Marcus was in Ad Seg, we were not allowed to have our usual face-to-face meeting. The typical mediation usually takes place in the prison’s visitation center or a small office, with the victim and offender sitting at a small table a few feet apart. For this meeting, we were seated in the small attorney booth. Karen sat on the metal stool, just a small round seat on a pole welded to the floor. A metal ledge, with years of scratched initials in the fading green paint, stretched across the glass window, which mirrored the same setting on the opposite side. A single phone receiver hung on the wall to the left just above the ledge. I was given a small plastic office chair that I had to place sideways behind Karen, between her stool and the booth door, which was closed behind us. I could not see Karen’s face, nor could she see me unless she turned around. As we waited, we finally heard keys jangle and a door slam, and then Marcus was standing inside the booth on the other side of the class, his hands handcuffed behind him. He squatted down and placed his cuffed hands through a metal slot in the door, and the guard took off the handcuffs. Slowly, he sat down, and they both picked up the phones beside them.

The mediation began with Karen asking Marcus to tell her what happened. He slowly and again very matter-of-factly began telling her about the day he killed Mallory. When he finished, Karen asked several other questions and also shared how much she lost when her daughter was killed, how difficult losing a child can be. Marcus just sat and listened. Karen asked him about his thoughts since the murder. He began by explaining that, since he is in his cell for twenty-three of the twenty-four hours of the day, he has thought a lot about his choices.

After a few minutes, Karen said, “I think you need to ask me for forgiveness.” Marcus did not respond to her request. Instead, he asked her a question about Mallory to change the conversation. Karen answered his question and appeared to let it go. At one point, he paused, and she said again, “I think you need to ask me for forgiveness.” When she repeated her statement a second time, he dropped his gaze and exhaled, "I don't feel I have the right." Showing the slightest emotion for only the second time in months.

As the mediator assigned to the case, I thought it was strange that she was even asking him that question. I knew from the beginning that, during the victim impact statement at his sentencing, she forgave Michael. And even this morning, she reminded him that she had forgiven him. But oddly, here in the cramped, awkward space, she was telling him to ask for her forgiveness. Marcus asked her another question about Mallory that Karen readily answered, and, finally, a third time, said, "I think you need to ask me for forgiveness."
Realizing she was not going to let this go, Michael lowered his head. I wondered if he was searching for his soul to see if those words were a part of his reality. We sat there in silence for what seemed like an hour, but eventually Marcus took a deep breath and croaked, "Will you forgive me?"

As soon as the words left his mouth, his gaze, still fixed on the ground, filled with tears—his vulnerability now visible. Karen said, oh so sweetly, “Of course I will.” In that moment, Marcus collapsed emotionally; the tears, once contained, spilled down his cheeks and off his nose. Sobs wracked his body, each breath coming with deep, shaking force. Through the glass, I saw Karen’s reflection: she, too, was weeping, swept up in Marcus’s overwhelming emotion. Moved by their shared vulnerability, I added my own tears to theirs.

After a few minutes, Marcus gained his composure again. He looked directly into Karen’s eyes and whispered. “Thank you.”

I asked Karen if she had any more questions or anything to say to Marcus. She said she did not. We wrapped up with a closing that acknowledged the incredible work involved. As we stood to leave, Karen looked at him, tears still in her eyes, and placed her hand on the glass. Marcus raised his hand to match hers. They stood for a few minutes, silent but sharing a powerful message of connection and compassion, before Karen turned and walked out of the booth.

Outside the booth, I asked Karen how she was doing. She said she was so pleased with the meeting. It gave her peace and healing. I told her it was interesting, and she told him he needed to ask her for forgiveness. She quickly said, “Oh, I didn’t do that for me. I did it for him.” I was taken aback. I asked if she knew what she was feeling or thinking when she did that. She looked almost embarrassed. "I hope this doesn’t make me sound crazy, but I think it was love," she said.

A prickling sensation like a thousand tiny ants ran through my spine, neck, and arms. I could not believe what I was witnessing. I told her, “I don’t think it is crazy at all. We are called to love our enemies, and you just demonstrated what that looks like in a powerful, tender way.” She smiled shyly.

We finished our debriefing and left the prison. On the drive home, I realized I had just witnessed the Gospel of Christ in human flesh. If anyone had the right to condemn Marcus for his actions—his sin—it was Karen. She could have demanded to lock him up and throw away the key. Yet she didn’t. Like Christ, she chose instead to forgive him and show him love. I knew I had been on holy ground inside that tiny, cold metal booth. Holy ground where the sacred occurred.