The national advocacy group Journey of Hope will focus attention on the death penalty when it presents a program at Eastern Kentucky University on Wednesday, Nov. 4.

The program, from 3:30 to 5 p.m. in Posey Auditorium of the Stratton Building, will examine personal experiences surrounding executions and homicides as well as their implications for setting policy. It is presented by the American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky and the Kentucky Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty.

Journey of Hope is led by murder victim family members joined by death row family members, family members of the executed, the exonerated, and others with stories to tell.

The program, sponsored by EKU’s College of Justice & Safety and Department of Government, will feature Journey of Hope founder Bill Pelke, who until his grandmother’s murder supported the death penalty. Eventually, the retired steelworker worked to save his grandmother’s assailant from execution. Joining Pelke will be Shujaa Graham, who was exonerated from death row after he was framed in the 1973 murder of a prison guard in Stockton, Calif., and Terri Steinberg, mother of Justin Wolfe, Virginia’s youngest death row resident.

The program is free and open to the public.