Preface

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Right before Arthur Brown was executed, he told me that he would shake his leg on the gurney to give me comfort.  That’s the type of person that Brown was.  Even in his final moments, he was thinking about how he could comfort me.  Since those dreadful moments, Brown has visited me often.

 

When I begin to consider the state of the world and depression sets in, my mind wanders back to Brown.  I see that leg shaking.  Hope returns.

 

The Rev. Dr. Jeff Hood

October 16, 2023

 

 

February 28, 2023

 

The Fight for Arthur Brown:  Brady Violations, Love & The Struggle to Save a Life

 

There is danger in looking for God.  For, sometimes in our looking we miss the finding.

 

Arthur Brown wasn’t at the top of my list.  In fact, I didn’t even know who he was until about nine months ago or so.  You see, I was working on the case of another guy on death row when Brown’s name popped up.  While I try not to look at the cases before I make contact with someone, this is a situation where I was told what was up.  It was awful.  The infamous Brownstone Lane Murders in Houston.  All the victims were Hispanic.  Four murder victims shot execution style.  One was pregnant.  Two people survived.  For a total of seven victims (including the unborn child).  As is often the case, the presented evidence in gruesome cases like this is damning.  I’d read that one of the victims identified Brown as one of the perpetrators.  I’d read that he fled.  So, I quit reading.  I just assumed that such facts were true.  Quite frankly, I’m a minister not an arbiter of facts.  It is my job to meet the condemned where they are…not where I or anyone else think they should be.  So, that’s what I did.

 

For months, we wrote letters back and forth…and communicated through mutual friends.  Then, the day arrived.

 

Just before 5am, I left the house to begin the arduous journey from Little Rock, Arkansas to the Polunsky Unit in Livingston, Texas…12-hours roundtrip.  With regard to my ministry with Arthur Brown, I prayed that God would reveal to me what I needed to know and make me what I needed to be.  With that, I was off.  By the time I arrived, I was very tired.  So, I went to the bathroom and splashed some water on my face.  By the time I sat down with Arthur, I was back alive and ready to go.  Expecting to see a hardened criminal, I was shocked when I saw his smile.

 

From the very beginning, I knew that Arthur was a warm person.  All of the guys that I work with know that I don’t just minister to the soul…I also work to save their lives.  So, Arthur launched into the various facts about his case.  I need to clearly state that almost every person that I’ve ever worked with does this.  Most proclaim innocence or at the very least try to excuse what they did.  Honestly, I feel like I’ve heard it all before.  This one was different.  Arthur’s spirit was different.  The way that he spoke about his case was of someone who was just flabbergasted by it all.  I listened closely.

 

Then, he dropped the bomb.  In recent days, various pieces of exculpatory evidence had been found by his attorneys.  The withholding of such evidence by prosecutors is known as a Brady Violation (named after Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963)).  In many situations, the existence of such material can stop an execution…and sometimes even exonerate someone.  So, I’m incredibly interested to see where the coming appeals of his lawyer lead.  Before our visit was finished, we got to talking about various pieces of literature.  One of my favorite authors came up, James Baldwin.  A quote from his If Beale Street Could Talk came to mind, “Neither love nor terror makes one blind: indifference makes one blind.”  It would be easy to walk away from this new exculpatory information that was shared with me.  It would be harder to engage it.  I looked deep into his eyes…a real human looked back.  While I knew I was never going to be completely certain about his case, I knew that I could not be indifferent to what he had shared with me.

 

Towards the end of our conversation, I told him that I believed that love was the highest manifestation of God.  Furthermore, I described the salvific power of God’s love.  Then, I wrapped up some of the spiritual conversation with an illustration, that the afterlife is swimming in a huge gelatin of electric love for all of eternity.  While he thought that was a beautiful illustration, he told me that he prayed it would be a little longer before he got to find out whether it was true.  With that, he affirmed his desire for me to be in the execution chamber with him if he ended up being executed next week (March 9).  After a few more affirmations, it was time to wrap it up.  So, I put my hand on the glass to give him a blessing.  “See the Light.  Become the Light.  Be the Light.”  With that, I told him I loved him and left.  The last thing I saw was his smile.

 

For hour upon hour, thoughts of action filled my head.  I had one week to save Arthur Brown’s life.  In the car, I decided I’d give it all I got.  So, let it begin…  If I fail, I will stand in the execution chamber, tell him that God loves him and watch him die.

 

 

March 9, 2023

 

Our moral imagination continues to be put to death in the execution chamber

 

Today, I am scheduled to watch Arthur Brown Jr. die. I mourn for more than him.

 

A group of leaders from Death Penalty Action joined me outside the Texas State Penitentiary in Huntsville on Tuesday (March 7) for a vigil while Gary Green was being executed inside the prison.

 

Today, morality will be asked of the state of Texas when the chamber will be opened once more. Among those scheduled for execution is Arthur Brown Jr. 

 

These are dangerous times. Our ability to interact with each other is limitless. Yet, our understanding of our common humanity seems to decline with each second — as if the more we connect, the less we really see each other. The less we are willing, even, to see ourselves beyond the masks we put on for society’s approval.

 

Indeed, our inability to love ourselves is precisely the source of our inability to engage with the other — including those we’ve condemned to death.

 

Who are we? We have ritualized killing. In the process, we teach each other that killing is OK. 

 

Morality doesn’t exist in a void; it exists in the places where we make moral decisions. The moral ethic of the chamber is death — and, ultimately, that says more about us than about the condemned.

 

When I visited Arthur last night he told me: “We live in the most supposedly Christian society in global history and yet we can’t seem to morally advance enough to stop killing each other.”

For decades, it has been presumed that Brown (along with co-defendants Marion Dudley and Antonio Dunson) brutally murdered Jose Tovar, Jessica Quinones (seven months pregnant), Frank Farias and Audrey Brown. In recent days, Arthur Brown Jr.’s attorneys have revealed critical new evidence in their final filings that could exonerate their client.

 

Unfortunately, society is conditioned to dismiss such claims as desperation. What’s wrong with desperation? Isn’t it part of the human condition to be desperate to preserve life? Maybe the wisest thing we could do when we think someone seems desperate is to figure out a way to connect our own desperation — that all of us inevitably feel at points in our lives — to the desperation they feel. Now is the time to try to touch Arthur Brown Jr., to try to find some level of empathy with him. Not to run away.

 

Maybe in encountering his final appeal, we might find a life worth saving, a life not all that different from our own. Then again, if we would take the time to listen, we would figure out that they’re all worth saving, because they are us and we are them. Our interconnectivity makes us human. Our ability to develop love for each other makes us divine.

 

If we are to see where God is, to know where love is, we must be willing to see and to be seen; to step into places of deep discomfort and offer our true selves. To do anything other than place our bodies into life, into the pursuit of being human, is to fail at the one thing that matters most: love. Love of self and love of neighbor. 

 

How are we to recapture any semblance of moral imagination? Surely, we must look to the evil we hide in the chamber.

 

As his spiritual adviser, I’ve been asked by Arthur Brown Jr. to accompany him to the execution chamber. If he is executed, I will watch him die. This is real. Legitimate, moral questions always are. At stake is who we are.

 

 

March 9, 2023

 

Revolution Now! : A Spiritual Advisor’s Cry After Witnessing the Execution of Arthur Brown Jr.

 

 

*Delivered outside of the Huntsville Unit

 

 

In the end, Arthur Brown was full of hope.  There is no doubt in my mind that this was a brother who lived his life full of hope.  Even in the execution chamber behind me…the most hopeless of hopeless places…Arthur brought the hope.  Within that dark place, Arthur cried out, “I’m not going to rest in peace…I’m going to rest in power.”  There is power in truth and Arthur knew that he was going to rest in truth.  So, instead of peace for Arthur…let’s pray like he did…for power for us all…power to push back against this evil that is the death penalty….this evil that is the broader state of injustice in our world.  Arthur knew what was up.  Power for all…not just peace for some.  Arthur knew that there is never true peace without the powerful truth that is justice.  There can be no peace this night…because there was no justice this night.  In fact, it is our job to make sure that there is no peace for the powerful until there is justice for the powerless.

 

Make no mistake, Arthur Brown was innocent.  The State of Texas executed an innocent man tonight…and they knew it.  Unfortunately, we live in a world that is willing to sacrifice the one in order to keep systems of injustice going.  I serve a God who loves all.  Anybody that keeps a system willing to sacrifice the one going…does not serve a God of love…they serve evil…they serve hate…oh how I wish they would turn back to love and stop all of this killing.

 

Tonight, let us turn our hearts to the project…not of peace…but of empowering the powerless…empowering those who society has disempowered.

 

I can’t conclude tonight without speaking to the obvious…a person of color was murdered here tonight…a person of color was lynched here tonight.  Let’s talk about all of this for what it is.  We have a person of color who has spent 30 years fighting against the State of Texas…30 years fighting against a system that was designed from the very beginning to kill him.  So often, people see a situation like this and they declare the system broken.  On the contrary, the system is doing exactly what it was designed to do…to break down and destroy the marginalized and oppressed.  The system was founded on racism, sexism, classism, injustice and oppression…the system did exactly what it was designed to do…it killed Arthur Brown…which is precisely why the system has to be overthrown…which is why we are in such desperate need of a revolution of hope.  That is what Arthur would encourage us all to aspire to…a revolution of hope…that destroys the system once and for all.  We must be about so much more than just peace…we must be about empowering the powerless…we must be about a revolution of the moral conscience of our society.

 

Revolution now!  I know that’s what Arthur Brown would want…and he will be with us until we get it.

 

So, let’s take a second to pray.  No more nice words.  Let’s learn to pray with our feet.  Let’s stand up.  Let’s speak out.  Let’s demand change.  Let’s pray with our feet.  Let’s pray so hard that we make Arthur Brown the last person executed in Texas.  Oh God…let us pray with our feet.  May we never have to gather in this space again.  Oh God…let us pray with our feet.

 

May the revolution begin with our feet!

 

Amen.

 

 

March 12, 2023

 

Rest in Power: My Final Conversation with Arthur Brown, Jr. (Immediately Before His Execution)

 

*This is my account of the final conversation I had with Arthur Brown, Jr. (as his spiritual advisor) immediately before he was executed by the State of Texas on March 9, 2023.

 

Danger always seems to lurk in spaces where we don’t know what’s next.  I guess that’s the nature of danger…the unknown.

 

Door after door opened and shut.  I didn’t know where I was going.  I just knew that I had to walk by faith and not by sight.  When the last one opened, I didn’t even know it was the last one.  I just knew I had to walk through it.

 

A few steps in front of me, Arthur Brown, Jr. sat in a small cage.  Immediately, Arthur stood up and placed his hands against the bars.  I quickly reciprocated.  To be honest, I didn’t come in with much to say.  How do you plan for a conversation that?  This brother had just an hour to live.  I felt a huge burden to offer something meaningful…something worth the usage of such precious time.  So, I uttered one last prayer.  Then, I opened my mouth.

 

Innocence is a loaded word.  Arthur used it often.  How can someone be innocent and be in such a circumstance?  Whether we admit it or not, that’s how most of us initially respond to such claims.  I don’t think we can help it.  Skepticism is a big part of who we are.  From the moment I met Arthur, I felt like there was something different about him.  I told him, “When the Spirit in me met the Spirit in you, I knew you.”  Throughout time and space, God has always had a way of joining us together.  We started with the Spirit…and in that difficult hour we were going to finish with the Spirit.

 

In that dark dungeon, I told Arthur that I felt like the Spirit was especially strong with him tonight.  “Dr. Hood, I’m just ready to go home.  Can you tell me about home?”  I didn’t hesitate.  The mood lifted a bit.  It was like we were waiting on a bus to pick him up.  I guess we were both waiting on the route that would take him home.

 

Over the years, Arthur had known love.  When I asked him what love felt like, he pointed his finger in every direction and sarcastically replied, “The opposite of this.”  I agreed.  We were in a place where people killed each other.  I mean the door to the execution chamber was right behind us.  Until it was time, I invited him to live into the opposite of all of this.  Perhaps, we could make heaven appear on earth.  In that moment, he began to relax.

 

“I think people should be jealous of you right now.”  Arthur couldn’t believe that I’d said such a thing.  Sensing his surprise, I explained, “You are about to die for something meaningful and real…your principles…your truth.  Most outside of these walls will waste away with no clear purpose whatsoever.”  I could feel his Spirit growing stronger.  “Home is about the fulfillment of purpose.  Your purpose is to speak your truth.”

 

“Texas is about to kill an innocent man!”  Arthur’s declaration moved me.  If people would listen, I felt like his truth could lead to abolition.  “I don’t think I’m going to get there with you.”  I knew he was right.  The execution was too close.  The destination of home too far away.

 

“I feel like Dr. King must have felt in Memphis the night before his assassination.”  I found the connection to be incredibly powerful.  King died knowing that his death would point to the promised land of freedom.  I too knew that Arthur’s death would point in the same direction.  “Keep pointing people home.”  I could feel the strength rising in his voice.

 

“What do you think I should say in there?”  I knew that Arthur was talking about his final statement.  I didn’t hesitate.  “Say the words that God has placed on your heart.”  “I got words of liberation on my heart right now Dr. Hood.”  “Say that then.”  “But how?”  “Just tell your truth.  God is in that truth.”  “That is the way home.”  “I think I know the way.”  “You are the way my friend.”  “Listen to the God who is in you.”

 

Leaning forward, I prayed, “God, give Arthur Your strength in this moment of trial…put Your words in his mouth…and seal his soul in You…the Home of all Homes.”

 

In that moment, I looked into Arthur’s eyes and told him I loved him.  After making me promise that I’d keep up the fight of abolition, he replied, “I’ll see you at Home.”

 

 

March 12, 2023

 

“Let anyone who is without sin…” : On Serving as Arthur Brown Jr.’s Spiritual Advisor During his Execution

 

I used to think that God was everywhere…but God don’t live in spaces like this.

 

I’d seen it all in pictures before.  The dim lights.  The harsh colors.  The small windows.  I don’t think it would’ve mattered how many times I’d studied those pictures before.  Nothing could have prepared me for standing in the midst of it all.  Death was now a place…a physical reality.  There would be no going back.  The valley of the shadow of death was more than just metaphor now.

 

I started to shake from the moment I entered the room.

 

What else was I supposed to do?  How else was I supposed to deal with all of the emotions bottled up within?  I was about to explode.

Completely immobilized, Arthur Brown laid on the gurney in the middle of the room.  When he saw me, he started to shake his foot.  I could see the white sheet moving rapidly.  I knew this was his way of telling me to stay strong.  I was trying.

 

My rosary cut into my hand.

 

Though the protocol had been shared with me, I was lost.  I couldn’t remember when I was supposed to speak.  It was so strange to have an order of service for an execution.  Propping my back up against the wall, I kept my legs straight.  On multiple occasions, I looked to the agent that was in charge of escorting me for guidance.  Then, the moment came.

 

I read as loudly as I possibly could.

 

Early in the morning he came again to the temple. All the people came to him, and he sat down and began to teach them. The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and, making her stand before all of them, they said to him, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” They said this to test him, so that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” And once again he bent down and wrote on the ground. When they heard it, they went away, one by one, beginning with the elders, and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus straightened up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” She said, “No one, sir.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you. Go your way, and from now on do not sin again.”

 

Nobody seemed to listen to the words of Jesus.  “Let anyone who is without sin…”  Either that or all of those who were participating were sinless.

 

The time came for Arthur to give his final statement.  In our visit before the execution, I’d encouraged him to use this opportunity to speak his truth to the world.  He did.

 

What is occurring here tonight is not justice, it’s murder of an innocent man for a murder that occurred in 1992. For the last 30 years I’ve proven my innocence to the courts, but the courts blocked me and then refused me access to the ballistics for 20 years; I’ve proven facts and ballistics to be false. It’s been 30 years now, the state refused to turn over evidence. Nine of the ten trial motions were filled for discovery of evidence, but each were denied each time. I asked for DNA, I was denied DNA. My co-defendant was executed in 2006 and if I’m innocent he was innocent and they killed an innocent man, and the state doesn’t want the truth to come out. They won’t allow me DNA. The victim’s son identified on audio tape it wasn’t me or the co-defendant. The state hid the evidence so long and good that my own attorneys couldn’t find it. Tonight, Texas will kill a second innocent man for a murder that occurred in 1992. I have no further words.

 

Before the poison completely took over, I told Arthur that he was loved.  “Keep fighting!  Use my truth…”  Right before he lost consciousness, he told me he loved me too.

 

For the next few minutes, I watched Arthur struggle to breathe.  In the midst of it all, all I could do was shake.  As the minutes grew longer, I kept asking God to forgive us.  Close to 17 minutes passed before Arthur was pronounced dead.  Those were some of the longest minutes of my life.  I couldn’t figure out what was taking so long.  How hard can it be to kill a man?

 

Just as quickly as it started…it was over.

 

The agent who had escorted me the entire night walked me out the door into the night.

I hugged him.  While I’m sure he thought it was strange, it felt like the most human thing to do on such an inhumane night.

 

I’m still looking for God…

 

*Last night, I became the first spiritual advisor to accompany the condemned into the execution chamber in two different states, Oklahoma and now Texas.  I was with Scott Eizember when he was executed on January 12, 2023.  Now, I’d been with Arthur Brown on March 9.  I’m still processing what it all means.

 

 

March 22, 2023 

 

The Eschatology of the Execution Chamber: A Primer

 

 

Before the execution, employees of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice kept asking me the same question, “Is Arthur saved?”  Far more than being concerned about the eternal consequences of their own participation in the execution, they were concerned about his eternal destination.  Repeatedly, I gave the same answer, “Saved from what?  Y‘all are the ones who are going to kill him.”  Evil can be so blinding.

 

Pressed against the cage, I sought to be love in the midst of such hate.  In those final moments before the execution, Arthur Brown and I spoke about that which is real and that which is not.  The discussion with Arthur was never about what types of prayers or eternal decisions I could extract out of him.  Rather, it was about me reminding him that God loves him more than anyone ever could…and that everything else is bullshit.  Love seemed to enhance his determination to go boldly out of this world clinging to what he knew to be true.  A calmness beyond all understanding flushed over him.  I knew that hate could not touch him.  Arthur was past all that now.  Truth and love were his oxygen.

 

Save for a few, there was a hollowness to almost everyone I encountered.  Questions of salvation are so often hollow.  Due primarily to the fact that such questions assume that we are all playing this cat and mouse salvation game with God.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  God loves us.  That’s it.

 

Even if I had the time to tell them about all of the beautiful moments I got to share with Arthur Brown, I doubt they would know what I was talking about.  Their minds are too condition to believe the lies of hate.  The lie that God would ever let any of us eternally perish.

 

Heaven is God’s love…the fullness of God’s love.  Hell is separation from God…the very absence of God.  Heaven exists for us to transcend such spaces.  We spread the love of God to destroy such places…that we might be transformed by such destruction.  In opposing the death penalty, one could say that we seek to bring the heaven (love) until we can destroy the hell (absence).  Of course, such destruction can only be accomplished through love.  Since God is love, I have no doubt that we will one day be successful.

 

Before Arthur Brown died, he reminded me that love always wins.  EVIL WILL ALWAYS BE DESTROYED.  For that, I am forever grateful.