That support took on a tragic and personal dimension in July of 1985 when his mother, Joyce, was brutally murdered by notorious serial killer Richard Ramirez. In the wake of this tragedy the couple initially sought support in their parish community, but they also joined other families of Ramirez’s victims in forcefully lobbying for his execution.
Today, Don and Patty are equally passionate in advocating for State Proposition 62, which would outlaw the death penalty in California, and against Proposition 66, which would expedite executions in the state. The Nelson’s 25-year journey of conversion on the issue of capital punishment is also the story of how the ministry of Restorative Justice in the Catholic Church has come to embrace victims of violent crime and their families in a way that it had not done before.
Following the shock and trauma of Joyce’s murder, Don, Patty and their five children were well supported by their parish, through the process of Catholic burial and by the ministries in which the couple was involved. But the family relocated after a few months and found that their new parish did not have a ministry in place for families who have lost a loved one to violence. And their pain and grief only seemed to be intensifying.
Don says he was angry at God and he began to drift away from his Catholic faith. Patty tried to remain involved in the parish but was also unable to let go of the anger and sadness of losing her mother-in-law. Meanwhile, they kept vigilance in the legal case of Ramirez, giving court statements and granting media interviews. Four years after Joyce’s murder, Ramirez was convicted and sentenced to death. They hoped for a quick appeals process so that justice could be served.
Despite his commitment to seeing Ramirez executed and his retreat from faith, Don says he came to know that it would not ease his grief.
“How do you find closure when you have to walk to a grave to visit your Mom?” he says.
Don’s distance from God and his Catholic faith continued for more than two decades. Then one day in 2011 Patty came home with a small flyer that she had spotted on the bulletin board at St. Paul the Apostle Parish in Chino Hills. It read, “Day of Reflection for Those Who’ve Lost a Loved One to Murder.”
“I knew that I needed this,” she recalls. “My heart was so hurt. After all these years I couldn’t let it go.”
She told Don she was going and didn’t expect him to join her. To her surprise, he did, though he says he went with expectation that retreat leader, Sister Sue Reif, O.S.F., would try to change his mind about the death penalty.
What he got instead was something he says he always needed from his Church.
“She listened to my story,” Don says of Sr. Sue, who was then Director of the Office of Restorative Justice for the Diocese. “Someone would finally listen and show that they cared. It was the beginning of the Church coming back into my life.”
The couple then took “incremental steps” in their view of the death penalty over the next couple of years. Another pivotal moment, Patty says, was a conversation with Sister Terry Maher, who, herself, had lost a loved one (her brother) to murder. They were talking about Ramirez and the heinous nature of his crimes. Patty still struggled to see any humanity in her mother-in-law’s killer.
“He has a piece of God in him that won’t leave,” Patty recalls Sr. Terry telling her.
“I realized I had to forgive him.”
When Ramirez died of natural causes in 2013 the Nelsons were relieved, because their conversion had brought them to a point where they did not want him to be executed.
“It was like taking a burden off our shoulders,” Don says of his change of heart on the death penalty, “handing it over to Christ to bear.”
The Nelsons have not been content in their own conversion. They continue to share their story for the benefit of Restorative Justice ministry to those who have been victimized by violent crime and their families. They have recently started a support group out of their home parish, St. Mother Teresa of Calcutta in Winchester, for those who’ve lost a loved one to murder.
Don also shared his story at a recent workshop on the two death penalty propositions offered by the Diocesan Restorative Justice Office at Holy Spirit Parish in Hemet.
“Telling our story is a gift,” Patty says. “We are healing every time we tell it.”