On the night Tahina Corcoran watched the state kill her husband at the Indiana State Prison, she rushed back to her car as fast as she could. It was around 1 a.m. on December 18, and she had already checked out of her hotel. “I knew before we headed to the prison for the execution that I would most likely want to get as far away from Michigan City as possible,” she said. She didn’t stop to talk to anyone. “I hated everybody there.”

She broke down when she got inside the car. Tahina’s 30-year-old son Justin, who also witnessed the execution, tried to comfort her. Then they started the two-hour trip back home. They didn’t discuss what they had seen. “I just kept thinking, ‘I gotta get me home, I gotta get me and my son home.’”

The following days were a blur. She was in shock and felt numb

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