Lisa Brown is the mother of Christopher Vialva, who was executed on September 24, 2020 at the United States Penitentiary in Terre Haute, Indiana. Christopher was 19 years old in 2000, when he became one of 6 young men convicted of a double homicide near Ft. Hood, Texas. Their case ended up in the federal system because the crime occurred on federal property. One of Vialva’s co-defendants, Brandon Bernard, was also sentenced to death for his role in the crime, and was executed shortly after Christopher Vialva. Tony Sparks, who was 16 at the time of the crime, was sentenced to life in prison for carjacking the couple who had been murdered by Christopher and Brandon, but that sentence was later reduced. Two teens were also given 17-year-prison sentences for their role in the crimes and a 15-year-old received a five-year sentence.
During the last 6 months of his presidency, Trump signed 13 death warrants, leading to the first federal executions carried out since 2003. Nearly half of them were Black, including Christopher Vialva, who was biracial and the first Black man executed by the federal government since 2003. One of the 13 people executed during Trump's "federal execution spree" was Lisa Montgomery, the first woman to be executed by the federal government in 70 years.
Lisa Brown says she only talked to her son’s defense attorney once during his trial. She says her son contracted meningitis at birth and suffered brain damage as a result, but the issue never came up during the trial. “What I was told is the trial attorneys chose not to have him evaluated,” Brown said. She raised Christopher and his sister as a single mother for most of their lives.
Lisa Brown said “Christopher dealt with the issues of not knowing what his identity was his whole life." She said Christopher dealt with a lot of racial bias growing up and fell in with the wrong crowd. “The boys Christopher was hanging out with at the time of the crime, those boys were biracial also, so he was trying to find a group that was just like him," she said.
When asked if her son has taken responsibility for the crimes he was convicted of, Lisa Brown replied, “The only thing my son has said is that he’s deeply remorseful for the pain he’s caused to the family, and me with his actions that day." During his time behind bars, Christopher became a Messianic Jew and spent two years convincing prison staff to allow him to conduct weekly services. He ministered regularly to fellow inmates. Eight of those inmates wrote character statements about Christopher, detailing the positive impact he had on them.
On September 24, 2020, Lisa Brown was joined by her sister in Terre Haute to witness the execution of her son Christopher.
On February 12, 2023, I sat down with Lisa at her home in Killeen, Texas to listen as she recalled the night that she witnessed her son's execution and described the extreme trauma that she has endured from this experience.
Click on the link below to read a letter that Lisa Brown received on the day after her son's execution, adding insult to injury and amplifying her immense grief from witnessing the execution of her son the day before the letter was written.
/media/uploads/2023/03/03/wardens-letter-to-lisa-brown.jpg
Click on the above video link to view a news story that contains an urgent appeal made by Lisa Brown to President Trump to spare the life of her son Christopher in the days leading up to his scheduled execution.
Click on the link below to read an article written by Liliana Segura for The Intercept about the execution of Lisa Brown's son, Christopher Vialva.
https://theintercept.com/2020/10/17/trump-execution-christopher-vialva/