Do you think God can forgive me?
Felipe Rodriguez:
So time went by, and I was locked in the same housing unit as Shawcross. I always noticed that he would sit on the floor. In Sullivan, the housing unit is the mess hall. They’ve got tables with four chairs, and you can only sit at a table if someone lets you. No one would eat with Shawcross, so he ate on the floor.
One day, I came from a Franciscan gathering and we had said the rosary, and I was feeling great. I was just floating with God. And I happened to look at Shawcross on the floor eating his food with his tray on his lap.
I said to myself, “What a hypocrite you are. You go to church. You thank God for everything. You ask God to help you. You pray to God every day, but you reach out to nobody. So, I went to Shawcross.”
I said, “Mr. Shawcross, get up from the floor and go sit at the table.”
He looked at me and said, “OK,” and he got up from the floor and he sat at the table, ate his food and said, “Thank you very much.”
The next day, he came out and went to sit on the floor. I looked at him and said, “Shawcross, come here. As long as I’m in this jail, you no longer sit on the floor. You sit at this table. That’s your chair.”
Many people came up to me and asked, “Why are you dealing with that serial killer. He’s an evil motherf----r. If you keep hanging out with him, we’re not gonna talk to you no more.”
I guess Shawcross noticed. Next morning, I came out and Shawcross said, “I don’t want to cause you problems. I’ll go sit on the floor.”
I said, “You stay at that table, and you make sure that you don’t worry about me. Worry about you.” And one day, I’d had enough and I shut the TV off in the day room and I said, “Listen up, all of you. Who in God’s name told you that you are judge, jury, DA, detective and everybody else who judged anybody in this place.
“All you people here are criminals. All you people have been deemed unworthy of society. So what makes you more worthy than this dude here? You think his crime is worst as well.
“Whether you are here for murder, whether you are here for robbery, whether you are here for rape, whether you are here for pedophilia, you are here for transgressing against another human being.
“So if you really want to make amends with society, then you have to start mending each other. If anybody has a problem with Shawcross, they have a problem with me.”
He sat at my table for another year. Quiet, we never said a word to each other. One day, he came out and said, “I want to thank you for what you did. You are my only friend. I did a lot of wrong things, and you are the only friend I got.”
I said, “You’re so very wrong, Man. Your best friend? His name is Jesus, dude. I’m just a drop in the sea, my man. I’m another man, like you, looking for a little bit of redemption, and looking for God to have mercy on me, and perhaps to give me a second chance to live life.”
We went like that for about six months, not even a word. One day he came out and says, “Tomorrow’s my birthday.”
I said, “Good for you,” and I ate my breakfast. I went to my cell and I wondered why the hell he told me tomorrow is his birthday.
I had a birthday card in my cell. So, I wrote a few words: “I have neither silver, nor gold, but what I have I give you. May Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ grant you much life, and may He take your heart and take everything that’s evil from you
and replace it with all good. Your brother in Christ,” and I signed it. That’s the best thing I ever did. Shawcross found the card amazing. We ate for his birthday. He made some sandwiches, and I brought him a cake. We celebrated his birthday by ourselves. So, about a week later, Shawcross, says, “Can I make a few drawings for your family?” Shawcross was an artist. He made three beautiful paintings for my sister and her new son. My sister wrote back a nice letter blessing him. He showed me the letter and he was crying and he said, “You guys have given me a little humanity.” I said, “No, my friend, you have given us a little bit of humanity,” and I asked, “Why did you do those paintings for my sister?”
He said, “What you did for me. I can never repay you. You were kind to me.”
I said, “All right, you can pay me one way. You can do one thing for me and we are even. You’ll never owe me anything. You’ll never have to feel bound to me in any way.” He said, “What’s that?” I said, “Go to church with me one day. Just once. You’ll never have to return. Just once.” He said, “I’ll think about it.” I said, “Fair enough.” He came out one day and put a satanic bible on the table and said, “I worship Satan.”
I said, “Good for you. If that makes you feel good, God bless
you, dude. Keep practicing what you practice.”
I went and got my Bible and I said, “This is my Bible. That’s what I worship. I’ll tell you what: Let me read yours, and you read mine. If I think yours is better than mine, I’ll convert. If you think mine is better than yours, then you convert. It’s a fair game.”
Shawcross took mine and I took his with two fingers because I didn’t wanna touch that s--t, but I took it because I proposed it. I put it in a paper bag and put it underneath my bed. I lit a white candle and left it there.
About a week later, he came around and said, “I like your book.” I said, “You like my book?” He said, “Yeah.”
So I opened it, I took my pen, and dedicated it to him.
I said, “This is my personal Bible. My wife gave it to me a long time ago. It’s yours to keep.” So he took it. I loved that Bible. Shawcross said, “Did you read my Bible?”
I said, “You want me to bulls-t you, or you want me to tell you the truth?” He said, “I want the truth.” I said, “Hell no.” He said, “It’s all right.” I said, “Can I get rid of it for you?”
He said, “Yeah.” So I took it to Father Stan and I said, “Father, this is Shawcross’ bible. You need to get rid of it.”
The next day, Father Stan said he put some holy water on it, he did a ritual and burned it.
Father Stan:
Artie was a Catholic. I make rounds. I meet people. You see a little spark. I knew that things were taking a different shape, and he would make a few paintings and donate to the church.
I said, “Yeah, Artie, thank you for all those things. They are good. But I want you in the church.”
I go to the visitors’ room every Saturday. I had interactions with Artie and his daughter. I would tell him, “Come to church. Come to church. Just come.”
Larry Sieteski:
We were well into Franciscanism when Arthur’s situation popped up. Father says Shawcross needs instruction in the faith and the sacraments. He volunteers me, even though I didn’t want to be in a room with Arthur Shawcross.
I would have to spend time alone with somebody who did what he did to children.
Father would remind me of my duties and what I professed to. Father Stan says, “Larry you are a teacher. You have a class of one. You are going to teach him the basics of the faith. You will work with him in the room. Felipe will work with him in the block.”
Arthur had the hardest time believing confession would work for him. I would tell him about my past and that I was in for something I was ashamed of and that I was using the last years of my time to make right.
I would say, “We have to look at your motivations. Are you really, really, sorry? Would you do it again, given who you are today?”
We spent some time in the Bible and some formation reading. If I gave him 60 pages to read, he would read 90 or 100.
He approached it in a very heartfelt way. I would question him on the point of the reading material that I wanted him to remember. He was with it. It wasn’t that he memorized things. We engaged in true education. He was sincere. He came around to the Catholic faith and the hope that he wouldn’t go to hell.
It was real that way. Arthur was a basic down-to-earth guy.
Otto Schaefer:
Arthur Shawcross came into three monthly sessions.
He made me feel uncomfortable. There was another man in the prison who had killed many people, Mad Dog Sullivan. Quite often, Joe Sullivan sat next to me and my wife in church. I was not afraid of Joe Sullivan. He killed on a contract. That was just his job. Sullivan didn’t kill for enjoyment.
Shawcross was different. He made me feel uncomfortable. It was his mannerism. The way he stared at people. His mannerism and his stare made him a frightening person.
I’ll never know how Felipe was able to turn that man around to want to be baptized. It took three years.
Felipe Rodriguez:
One day, Shawcross said, “I’ll go Sunday to church with you. Only one Sunday.” I said, “OK. Good. Let’s go.” He asked, “Do you think God can forgive me?”
I said, “His mercy is so majestic that He gave His only begotten Son for you. He loves all his creation and He wants to forgive you. However, forgiveness can only be attained by the desire to be forgiven. Want it, and He will give it to you.”
He said, “People are not going to accept me in church because people hate me.”
I sang in the choir and I told Shawcross that he could sit next to me there. He cried through the entire Mass. His tears flowed and he followed the Mass. But he cried through the entire Mass because he said he was sorry for everything he did.
After Mass on Sunday, Shawcross told Father Stan that he wanted to go to confession. Father gave him a hug. I got Father’s stole, the holy water and Father’s chair. Shawcross looked at me like a lost soul.
I said, “This is where you are going to be free of all your burdens. Let Father hold on to that.”
Shawcross walked into Father’s office. They were inside for more than an hour.
Father walked out of there so tired, exhausted. I had never seen him like that. He went home.
I arranged for Shawcross to go to the chapel from morning to night. He had carte blanche in the sanctuary. I would come sometimes and find Shawcross kneeling before the altar looking at the tabernacle. On many occasions, I caught Shawcross crying in the sanctuary.
One time, Shawcross asked me why I was in prison. I said I was wrongly accused of murdering a lady. Shawcross looked at me and said, “You don’t have it in you. If I was ever in Queens, I would say I did it because I know you didn’t kill her.”
That was the nicest thing I ever heard. Artie was the only guy who ever came outright and told me, I believe you are innocent.
This monster, this violent guy who everybody despised, and I once despised, a guy who I thought deserved to be hanged, this guy decided to display some mercy and some graciousness upon me and tell me I was innocent.
Father Stan:
I was going to do something special for Shawcross, a reception into the church. To call it baptism, it wasn’t baptism, but I hoped to start giving him communion.
He started coming to church, normal like any other person.
He came to our weekend retreat REC. He was here Friday, Saturday, Sunday.
By Monday, Tuesday, he is dead. He had made his peace with God and passed away.
Felipe Rodriguez:
Shawcross was all in. He asked to be baptized and asked me to be his sponsor. Then he went for gallbladder surgery at a hospital in Albany. He came back in a wheelchair. He came to a REC retreat for two days.
The second day, everybody loves this guy. On that second day, something happened. He was supposed to be baptized, but he died.
Arthur John Shawcross passed away Nov. 10, 2008, at the age of 63, from a pulmonary embolism. The New York State Correction Commission later reported that, in his last hours, the Sullivan Correctional Facility gave Shawcross “grossly negligent, incompetent and inadequate medical evaluation and treatment,” helping to cause his death.
Shawcross reported that his leg had become painful and he could not walk. He requested another wheelchair. A nurse refused to send one, saying that regulations called for Shawcross to walk to the infirmary.
A corrections officer pleaded for help. He reported that, returning from a chapel service, two Catholic inmates had helped Shawcross walk into his cell.