I was not born a Christian, but from everything I have heard, if someone repents for their sins, they are forgiven by Jesus Christ, the Lord. May be those murderers in AR repented, and pastor Huckabee felt it was his Christian duty to pardon them.
That is now how my Hindu religion works. Every good deed and every sin you commit determines what kind of life you will get after re-incarnation. Sins are never forgiven. You have to pay for them by doing enough good deeds to have chance at a better life during next life.
You don’t understand. Repentance of sin means God has forgiven the person. It has absolutely nothing to do with legal punishment; the debt to society still must be paid.
Otherwise we’d have every criminal running around saying, “I’m sorry, I repent” and getting loosed onto society.