Nor did the prosecutor's comments about Charisse and Lacie in the closing argument violate the Constitution. The jury had earlier seen a videotape of the murder scene that in- cluded the slashed and bloody corpses of Charisse and Lacie. In arguing that Payne deserved the death penalty, the pros- ecutor sought to remind the jury that Charisse and Lacie were more than just lifeless bodies on a videotape, that they were unique human beings. The prosecutor remarked that Charisse would never again sing a lullaby to her son and that Lacie would never attend a high school prom. In my view, these statements were permissible.
Murder is the ultimate act of depersonalization.
Brief for Justice For All Political Committee et al. as Amici Curiae 3. It transforms a living person with hopes, dreams, and fears into a corpse, thereby taking away all that is special and unique about the person. The Constitution does not preclude a State from deciding to give some of that back. The Eighth Amendment does not prohibit a State from choosing to admit evidence concerning a murder victim's personal characteristics or the impact of the crime on the victim's fam- ily and community. As the Court notes in today's decision, we do not reach this issue as no evidence of this kind was introduced at petitioner's trial.