On Saturday, August 16, nearly 80 people from across North Carolina gathered at Pullen Memorial Baptist Church in Raleigh for We Keep Us Alive: An Afternoon to Remember Those Executed & Envision a Future of Abolition. For four hours, the fellowship hall was alive with voices – some familiar to this work for decades, some brand new – brought together by a shared commitment to ending the death penalty in our state.
The room itself told a story. Along the back wall, tables overflowed with movement history and present-day struggle: the campaign to free James Richardson, April Barber Scales’ advocacy, Kat Bodrie’s work with Bramble Press, Pastor Dewey’s book, and artwork from people who lived on death row. A reflection corner invited people to answer a simple but profound question: What does abolition mean to you? Participants collaged, wrote, and discussed their responses in layer upon layer of hope and imagination.
The day began in community, lifted by the voices of Pastor Dewey Williams, Lynne Williams, and Britton Buchanan. The NCCADP Family Survivor Engagement Group offered a statement on why the death penalty must end, naming its endless cycle of harm and grief. Poet Nick Courmon debuted “Inescapable,” weaving together the urgency of this political moment with the decades-long call for abolition.
Then, we split into creative workshops designed to push our imaginations wider, deeper, freer. Some explored the ways abolition lives in our bodies; others invited artistic play and collective visioning. One, unforgettable, brought together three of North Carolina’s death row exonerees – Henry McCollum, Alfred Rivera, and Ed Chapman – who shared their stories in the same space for the first time since their release from Central Prison. Their presence was a living testament to why this system cannot stand.
When workshops ended, participants gathered in small groups to reflect on the insights, questions, and commitments they carried forward. Then it was time to march.
In the sweltering mid-August heat, about 50 people walked from Pullen to the gates of Central Prison. Voices rose in chants; signs bore the names of the 43 people executed by North Carolina since 1976. At the prison gates, we stood in vigil, reading those names aloud one by one. Kat Bodrie offered a poem. Together, we refused silence in the face of state violence.
Back at Pullen, the day ended in circle, in song, in community. Joined hand in hand, we sang “We Shall Not Be Moved.” Each person offered a single word to capture what the day meant. Again and again, the same words returned: love, community, hope.
At the event, NCCADP launched the No Death Penalty Pledge, a public commitment to justice rooted in life, not death; to accountability, healing, and humanity. This pledge carries us into the next anniversary year – twenty years without an execution in North Carolina. The message is undeniable. It is time for our state to let the death penalty go.
It is impossible to measure the depth of what was shared on August 16. But it was clear in every note sung, every story told, every step marched, every word spoken that this movement is alive. We sustain each other. And together, we are building the future where the death penalty no longer exists.
We are grateful to every person who made this day possible – attendees, volunteers, facilitators, artists, and leaders. Thank you for showing up, for remembering, for resisting, for imagining. This work is only possible because we keep us alive.
