MARIETTA JAEGER-LANE
Cofounder &
Board Member
JOURNEY OF HOPE...
from violence to healing™
"Loved ones, wrenched from our lives by violent crime, deserve more beautiful, noble and honorable memorials than pre-meditated, state-sanctioned killings. The death penalty only creates more victims and more grieving families. By becoming that which we deplore -- people who kill people -- we insult the sacred memory of all our precious victims."
MARIETTA JAEGER-LANE
DETROIT, MICHIGANPROFILE:Marietta Jaeger's daughter Susie was abducted at the age of seven during a family camping trip in Montana. For over a year afterwards, the family knew nothing of Susie's whereabouts. Shortly before the one-year anniversary of Susie's disappearance, Marietta stated to the press that she wanted to speak with the person who had taken her child. On the anniversary date, she received a call from a young man who taunted her by asking, "So what do you want to talk to me about?"
During the year following Susie's disappearance, Marietta had struggled to balance her rage against her belief in the need for forgiveness. Her immediate response to the young man was to ask how he was feeling, since his actions must have placed a heavy burden on his soul. Her caring words disarmed him, and he broke down in tears on the phone. He subsequently spoke with Marietta for over an hour, revealing details about himself and the crime that ultimately allowed the FBI to solve the case.
Marietta was to learn that Susie had been killed on a remote Montana ranch a week after she disappeared. Despite her family's tragedy, she remains committed to forgiveness and has been an ardent opponent of the death penalty for the over 25 years since Susie's death.
Reprinted with permission from Not in our Name: Murder Victims Families Speak Out Against the Death Penalty, a publication of Murder Victims Families For Reconciliation (Barbara Hood & Rachel King, Editors; MVFR
Marietta Jaeger was a founding board member of MVFR 1992-1996 and is cofounder and board member of the Journey of Hope...From Violence to Healing.
Marietta has been on the Indiana, Georgia, California, Virginia, Texas, Missouri 2001, Tennessee and North Carolina Journey's. Marietta was a key organizer of the California Journey.
THE JOURNEY’S FAVORITE MARIETTA SITES:
MY WRESTLING MATCH WITH GOD: Catholics Against Capital Punishment by Marietta Jaeger
HE
KILLED MY CHILD BUT I DON'T WANT HIM TO DIE:
Parade Magazine -- By David
Wallenchinsky
HOW
I CAME TO FORGIVE THE UNFORGIVABLE: US
Catholic Magazine By
Robert McClory
ABCNEWS.COM: Family Members of Murder Victims Reflect on Execution -- by Buck Wolf
BISHOP BRUNETT: Stories of Violence and Responses to It
NEBRASKANS
AGAINST THE DEATH PENALTY ANNUAL DINNER -- 2000
FORGIVING HER
CHILD'S KILLER
CAPITAL PUNISHMENT - CREDO
TENNESSEE
TAKES STEP BACKWARDS WITH FIRST EXECUTION IN 40 YEARS
FEATURED SPEAKERS
THE
HEALING POWER OF REDEMPTION: etc.
Magazine -- By Allen Mills
SHEDDING
LIGHT ON A DARK SUBJECT: -- The
Quaker Abolitionist -- By Tim Lietzke
THE
MARIETTA JAEGER STORY:
By Shirley Dicks