What goes into deciding whether another person is deserving of life? 

Certainly a lot of trust that a criminal justice system can keep capital punishment from ever being erroneously applied. 

Like many political issues, the death penalty mostly sets up as a debate with party-line predictability. Stephen Humphries, a Monitor culture writer, and Riley Robinson, a staff photographer with a gift for portraiture, went to Oklahoma, long the state with the highest per capita rate of execution. It was an emotional trip.

What they found was a tough-on-crime state pausing for a thought shift. Not away from accountability, but toward more restorative approaches to ensuring it. Stephen’s story today is about an openness to transformation.