Death Penalty Foes To Speak at Stamford Church

STAMFORD, Conn. — A Stamford woman who sat through a capital murder trial in the killing of her brother will share her story and push for the repeal of the state's death penalty Sunday at Faith Tabernacle Missionary Baptist Church.

“My experience with the prosecution of my brother's killer and my observance of our state's use of the death penalty has led me to the conclusion that Connecticut's death penalty divides and harms surviving family members,” Stamford resident Catherine Ednie said in a statement. “The death penalty here divides victims by attempting to reserve it for the ‘most heinous’ crimes, but every family who loses a loved one to murder sees their crime as the most heinous.”

Ednie’s brother, David Froelich, and four of his friends were murdered in Georgetown in 1995. She is one of 100 victim family members speaking out against capital punishment in Connecticut, the statement said.

Joining Ednie will be Juan Roberto Melendez-Colon, who spent more than 17 years on Death Row in Florida after being falsely convicted for the murder of Delbert Baker in 1984. After Melendez-Colon had spent 16 years in prison, a transcript of a confession to Baker’s murder was found, and it was learned that the prosecutor had withheld the transcript as evidence, the statement said. Melendez-Colon is one of 138 Death Row inmates who have been exonerated since 1973, the statement said.

“We must get rid of the death penalty because no matter how hard you try to fix the law, it is a human law, it is made and administered by humans and humans make mistakes,” the New York native said.

The program begins at 1 p.m. in Faith Tabernacle Missionary Baptist Church, 29 Grove St., Stamford. 

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