Sue Norton sat with the family of Justin Thurber as a jury said he should receive a death sentence for killing Jodi Sanderholm two years ago.
Norton now lives in Arkansas City but she’s from Oklahoma, where her father and stepmother were killed in January 1990. The man convicted of killing them, Robert Knighton, was executed by lethal injection on May 27, 2003.
“It was 13 years of wondering what would happen next,” Norton said. Then she watched Knighton’s execution.
“I can tell you, the death penalty is not absolution,” she said. “It didn’t bring them back.”
Norton may have gotten a little too involved in the Sanderholm case, Cowley County prosecutor Chris Smith said. Two weeks before the trial, when Thurber offered to plead guilty to killing Sanderholm, her family learned about it from Norton.
“We would have liked to have been able to present this to them and talk to them about it,” Smith said.
Don Anderson of the Kansas Coalition Against the Death Penalty also sat through the trial, as he has done in every capital murder trial in the Wichita area since I began covering courts in 2000.
Anderson was adamant that the state should have accepted Thurber’s plea. Afterwards, Anderson released a written statement:
The terrible murder of Jodi Sanderholm was an unspeakable tragedy.The coalition affirms that life without parole is a sufficiently severe punishment for Justin Thurber that also protects the public.
More of Norton’s comments following the verdict:
(Video/Travis Heying, The Wichita Eagle)
6 Comments
I’m sick of anti-death penalty crybabies whining. Justin Thurber is a piece of excrement who deserves exactly what he’s getting. He showed Jodi Sanderholm no mercy as he brutally raped, beat and strangled her, making her suffer. Thurber is a walking piece of filth who is getting off far easier than he let off Ms. Sanderholm. I hope someone at El Dorado treats him the same way he treated Jodi.
It’s about time someone get the death penalty. I was sick to my stomach when Kelsey Smith’s cold-blooded killer got life. I still am sick over that one.
Here in Kansas, the method of execution might still be by hanging. There are stories in the old West, where problems occured with hangings … toes touching the ground, broken ropes, etc. Gas chambers might leak … killing the observors by mistake. Lethal injections might miss the artery/vein. Firing squad members all firing over and around the head of the prisoner.
I’m convinced that death by guillotine is probably the best method. Its sure to work, quickly, with few problems possible. Saves on electricity, chemicals, poison gas and bullets. Advertising possible on the guillotine structure. Patents to Dr. Guillotine have probably expired by now.
Sue Norton absolutely makes me want to vomit. She apparently does not have children because if she did she would surely understand the death penalty being justified in this case in particular. I personally think MONKEYBOY (Thurber) should die in the same manner that beautiful young lady died. If he were put to death tommorrow it would not be soon enough, and certainly would not be a loss to society. Jodi was obviously the loss as I watch from a distance. MONKEYBOY could have worked all his life and not made the contributions to the community or society that Ms. Sanderholm had to offer. As for the Christians in Cowley County I would bet there are some Christian Country Boys in Cowley County that would love to help MONKEYBOY die in the same fashion Jodi died. I hope he enjoys his time in prison while he appeals, that should be fun too!! I can see how he could have handled Jodi, but he doesn’t look like much of a match for a grown man.
Fry that Neanderthal lookin’ sob.
It it not up to Ms. Norton to decide whether executing Thurber will give the Sanderholm’s peace. Jodi was not her daughter and Norton needs to keep her pignose out of their business. Thurber should be put down just like a dog. I’m sick of Kansas being so pacifist and all of the anti-death penalty liberal whining. If this would have happened in OK or Texas, Thurber would have been dead already and nobody would have thought twice.
I don’t think the name-calling is an appropriate use of this forum. This is why comments aren’t allowed on our crime stories, but we’d like to keep a civil discourse open here.
This kind of language hurts your credibility. You claim to have sensitivity for the Sanderholms. Yet you attack Sue Norton, who also suffered a great loss in a brutal murder (read the link to the story of her crime) simply because she holds a different political view.
We like to offer opposing views, which is why comments are always welcome. But let’s leave personal insults of it, please.
I should also clarify one point: if this happened in Texas or Oklahoma Thurber would not be “dead already.” As Norton pointed out, it took 13 years in Oklahoma to put her father’s killer to death.
What I’ve learned in a decade of covering these kinds of terrible crimes is that the emotional toll transcends politics and pain is bi-partisan.