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   From: zinn@reno.us   
      
   The family members of Oregon murder victims are tearing into Gov. Kate   
   Brown (D.) for commuting the sentences of the state's 17 death row   
   inmates.   
      
   "I'm horrified and outraged and I don't know what this means. … Will true   
   life be true life?" said Sue Shirley, whose parents were murdered in 1988.   
   "All I know is that we never get to have a say."   
      
   Brown was a popular scapegoat during the 2022 Oregon gubernatorial race   
   for a slew of failed left-wing policies on homelessness and crime. Even   
   her former Democratic ally Tina Kotek, who in November was elected the   
   Beaver State's next governor, distanced herself from Brown's record and   
   attacked the outgoing governor in debates and interviews.   
      
   Brown's office did not respond to a request for comment. Oregon has not   
   executed an inmate since the 1990s.   
      
   "I have long believed that justice is not advanced by taking a life, and   
   the state should not be in the business of executing people—even if a   
   terrible crime placed them in prison," Brown said in a statement, while   
   acknowledging that victims' families have experienced "pain and   
   uncertainty" from deferred sentences. She also said the decision was not   
   made because of any "rehabilitative efforts" by the inmates.   
      
   Brown, who was voted America's most-hated governor for the last two years,   
   did not give advance warning to the families that the sentences of their   
   loved ones' killers would be commuted to life in prison without parole,   
   the Oregonian reported. Some relatives of victims expressed concern that   
   justice will never be served, as they have already endured many   
   resentencing hearings and redefinitions of the criminal code, leading them   
   to wonder whether the murderers may eventually be freed.   
      
   Brown was responsible for prolonging a moratorium on the death penalty   
   begun by former governor John Kitzhaber (D.) in 2011. Oregon voters   
   reinstated capital punishment in 1984 after the state's Supreme Court   
   outlawed it three years earlier.   
      
   Her order will take effect Wednesday. She had already dismantled the   
   building that housed the state's death chamber in 2020.   
      
   The Oregon Senate's Republican leader, Tim Knopp, criticized Brown for   
   unilaterally deciding to commute the sentences, saying she hadn't put it   
   up for a vote.   
      
   "Even in the final days of her term, Brown continues to disrespect victims   
   of the most violent crimes," he said in a statement.   
      
   James Baker, whose daughter and grandchildren were brutally murdered   
   around Christmas 2001, told the Oregonian that Brown's decision was "wrong   
   and wrong."   
      
   "Every single year we can't forget, and every time Christmas rolls around,   
   what we think about this," he said. "We have our scrapbooks and our   
   pictures and we go through them around this time and realize these people   
   are gone, and they are gone forever."   
      
   Terri Hakim, whose husband, a police officer, was killed by a father and   
   son who bombed a bank in December 2008, called Brown's commutations "a   
   very personal slap in the face." The clemency, she said, will "make it   
   harder for the victims to go through their days, knowing that our governor   
   is looking out for [the convicted murderers] and not us."   
      
   Published under: Crime, Death Penalty, Kate Brown, Murder, Oregon   
      
      
      
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    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)