[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

Dec. 7



INDIA:

Madras High Court upholds death penalty in Dharmapuri bus burning case


The Madras High Court has upheld the death sentence awarded by a lower
court to 3 AIADMK functionaries in the Dharmapuri Bus burning case in
which 3 college girls were burnt to death in 2000.

Dismissing the appeals filed by the accused, Justices D Murugesan and V
Periakaruppiah upheld the February 16 order of the Salem First Additional
District and Sessions Judge convicting and sentencing Nedu alias
Nedunchezhiyan, the then Dharmapuri town secretary of AIADMK, Madhi alias
Ravichandran, MGR Forum functionary, and P Muniappan, former Panchayat
President to death.

The High Court also upheld the lower court order convicting and sentencing
25 other accused to 7 years rigorous imprisonment in the case.

(source: Indlaw Communications)

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Death penalty after a decade


By confirming a landmark judgement of death penalty the Madras High Court
has given this capital punishment almost after a decade.

Earlier the High Court had confirmed the death penalty in Auto Shankar
case and subsequently in1996 in the Adyar student Sri Ram murder case.
After a gap of a decade on the basis of the Supreme Court judgments it is
noted that the 3 had been confirmed the sentence to death in the
Dharmapuri Bus Burning case.

(source: Chennai Online News Service)






EUROPEAN UNION:

EU agreed death penalty day, Poland lifts veto


The European Union agreed on Friday to establish a European day against
the death penalty after Poland's new government lifted its predecessor's
veto on the idea.

The euro-skeptic government of Jaroslaw Kaczynski had blocked the move for
months, saying such an event should also condemn abortion and euthanasia.
Kaczynski and his twin brother, President Lech Kaczynski, spoke out
personally in favor of the death penalty but did not try to restore it
while in power.

The centre-right Civic platform party led by Donald Tusk, who became prime
minister last month, has taken a more pro-European stance.

"Ministers approved the European day against death penalty after Poland
lifted its reserve," an EU official said.

"The EU Presidency said that European values were back on the table," the
official said after justice ministers decided on Friday to make October 10
an annual symbol of the 27-nation bloc's long-standing abolition of
capital punishment.

The dispute had become emblematic of tense relations between Warsaw and
Brussels.

It is compulsory for EU states to abolish the death penalty.

Poland, along with Ireland and Malta, bans abortion on demand, and its
priests and politicians often condemn what they call a "culture of death"
permitting euthanasia in countries such as the Netherlands.

(source: Retuers)






KENYA:

Man's Killer Gets Death Sentence


A man found guilty of killing a male friend of his brother's widow has
been sentenced to death.

William Chemase Sitienei stabbed Mr Daniel Kipketer Bartilol to death on
June 6, 1999, in Uasin Gishu District.

"He had spied on the deceased, planned the attack and had a motive, that
was jealousy, of the deceased, as his brother's widow preferred the
deceased to the accused," ruled Mr Justice Ibrahim presiding over the case
in Eldoret.

Rejected by woman

Sitienei was angry that his sister-in-law, whom he wanted to marry, had
rejected him for her neighbour.

A man who sold a stolen hen to a police officer was jailed for nine years
Thursday by a Nyahururu court.

Joseph Ndung'u admitted committing the offence when he appeared before
court.

On October 7, the complainant returned from a visit to find that his
kitchen had been broken into and 7 chicken stolen, the court was told.

On going to report at Ol Kalou Police Station, he saw one of the birds
outside a policeman's house.

The officer identified Ndung'u as the seller.

(source: The Nation)






JAPAN----executions

Japan hangs 3 murderers


Japan hanged murderers on Friday and revealed their names and details of
the crimes in a new policy aimed at bolstering support for executions,
which are running at their highest level in 31 years.

The 3 hanged on Friday included Seiha Fujima, 47, who killed a 16-year-old
girl, her mother and a sister after the girl refused his romantic
advances, the justice ministry said in a statement.

The other 2, Hiroki Fukawa, 42, and Noboru Ikemoto, 74, were also
convicted of multiple murders, the ministry said.

The Justice Ministry had previously announced only the number of people
hanged, although Japanese media would reveal their identities.

"I believe that the information was disclosed so that we gain
understanding from the public that executions are being carried out in an
appropriate manner, with the focus on feelings of the victims," said Chief
Cabinet Secretary Nobutaka Machimura

Justice Minister Kunio Hatoyama, who backs the death penalty, told a
parliamentary panel he had sought the change.

Opinion polls show most Japanese favour capital punishment despite
relatively low rates of crime, which a study published this week showed
had fallen further since 2002.

The deaths bring the number executed to nine this year, the highest number
since 1976, but still way below the United States, where 42 death
sentences have been carried out in 2007.

"We welcome signs of opening up amid the secrecy that surrounds the
capital punishment system," advocacy group Amnesty International said in a
statement.

"But we strongly protest the fact that this is the 3rd round of executions
this year and nine people have been executed."

Japan's capital punishment has been widely criticised, including by the UN
Committee against Torture, partly because those on death row are not told
when they will be executed until the day they are hanged. Many remain on
death row for decades.

Forum 90, a group that campaigns against the death penalty, said 107
people were now on death row.

"I get the impression that they are trying to emphasise what bad men these
people are," said Koichi Kikuta, a lawyer and emeritus professor at Meiji
University.

"True disclosure of information would include the convict's psychological
state before the execution. They should also inform relatives ahead of
time so that they have a chance to meet them."

Hatoyama came under fire after proposing in September that death sentences
should not require the signature of the minister.

A previous justice minister, Seiken Sugiura, had not signed any death
warrants because of his religious beliefs.

Lawyers and human rights groups have expressed concern that sentencing
will become harsher because of a new emphasis in Japan on the opinions of
crime victims and their families.

Last month a U.N. committee passed a resolution calling for a moratorium
on capital punishment, although similar moves have been rejected by the
world body's general assembly in the past.

Executions are effectively on hold in the United States as the Supreme
Court prepares to rule on the legality of lethal injections.

(source: International Herald Tribune)

***********************

Secrecy of Japanese executions


Noboru Ikemoto, a pensioner who had been convicted of killing 3 people,
probably did not have any idea that his evening meal on Thursday was to be
his last.

Seiha Fujima, convicted of killing 5 people while in his early 20s, will
also not have known he was about to be taken to the gallows.

Nor would Hiroki Fukawa, a convicted double killer.

Japan does not tell death row prisoners that they are to be hanged until
the last possible minute.

This has been condemned by the international community.

The failure to give advanced notice of executions is incompatible with
articles 2, 7 and 10 of the International Covenant on Civil and Human
Rights, according to the United Nations Human Rights Committee.

But it is arguably no more cruel than the conditions in which death row
inmates are kept while awaiting their fate.

Some reports put the average amount of time a prisoner given the death
penalty waits for the sentence to be carried out at seven years and 11
months. It is hard to get an accurate figure.

'Harsh regime'

Amnesty International says the inmates live under "a harsh regime and in
solitary confinement with the ever-present fear of execution. They never
know if each day will be their last."

Reports in the Japanese media describe how the men are kept in
"toilet-sized cells".

Because they are awaiting execution, they are held mostly in detention
centres, not prisons. They have fewer rights than other prisoners.

It is reported that they are permitted 2 periods of exercise a week (3
times in summer) and not even allowed to do limited exercise within their
cells.

Again it is hard to confirm what the conditions are actually like for each
inmate - the nature of the regime is up to the director of each detention
centre.

But many of those kept locked up alone for years are now getting older.

The oldest is said to be Tomizo Ishida, who is 86. He was convicted for
rape and double murder in the early 1970s.

Some die before the sentence can be carried out.

In total there are 104 people on death row in Japan. So far this year 9
have been executed.

Before 1998 the Ministry of Justice would not even confirm that executions
had been carried out. There was simply an annual total released.

Only in the last 10 years has it released details of how many inmates were
executed on a particular day.

Small step forward

Friday's executions were the 1st time it has announced the inmates' names.

Japan's Justice Minister Kunio Hatoyama says this was done "to gain the
understanding of the bereaved families of the victims and the public over
the appropriateness of executions".

Amnesty International, while "strongly protesting" the decision to execute
the three convicted murderers, acknowledges that the change in policy over
the naming of those executed represents a shift towards more openness -
but it adds that there is a long way to go.

There were no candlelit vigils outside the detention centres where the men
were hanged - though this is not surprising since no one, not even their
families, was told they were to die on Friday morning.

Critics of the process say that the still quite considerable secrecy
surrounding the executions is not only cruel, it is stifling debate about
the issue.

Lawmakers rarely raise the question of the death penalty in parliament.

Opinion polls suggest only 6% of Japanese people oppose the practice,
though campaigners say this is because few people know much about the
conditions in which the death row inmates are kept.

Friday's executions were not headline news here.

In other countries, opposition to the death penalty is often mobilised by
Christian churches. But religious groups in Japan have chosen not to
campaign on the issue.

Japan's foreign ministry was reluctant to discuss the circumstances
surrounding the latest executions with the BBC.

It should be pointed out that Japan incarcerates a far smaller proportion
of its citizens than Britain or the United States.

But critics of the justice system are concerned about its reliance on
confessions. There are allegations that in some cases these are forced
from suspects by police and prosecutors.

Those who oppose the death penalty here say there are not enough
safeguards to prevent innocent people being put to death.

(source: BBC News)

********************

Dick Marty condemns executions in Japan


Dick Marty, Chair of the Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights of
the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) condemns the 3
hangings carried out recently in Japan.

"I deeply regret that, in carrying out these cruel and archaic executions,
Japan, an observer country to the Council of Europe, has moved away from
the pan-European consensus against capital punishment. The reason put
forward by the authorities for giving further information on the crimes
that led to these executions, namely to 'secure wider public support',
cannot be accepted in a society that respects human rights", he said.

"The European consensus on this subject has just been confirmed by the
designation of 10 October as European day against the death penalty, at
the meeting held in Lisbon by the Council of Europe and the Portuguese
Presidency of the European Union.

Beyond our continent, the countries of Europe, under the aegis of Italy,
have launched a major initiative in the UN General Assembly, with the aim
of achieving a global moratorium on executions", he added.

(source: Trend News)






BARBADOS:

Barbados for death penalty


BARBADOS HAS VOTED against a move at the United Nations to temporarily
stop state executions worldwide.

Although Barbados hasn't executed any convicted killers for about 20
years, the country, according to its Ambassador Dr Chris Hackett, opposed
the European-led resolution in the Third Committee of the General Assembly
because it believed the death penalty was a national issue to be decided
by individual sovereign states and should not be forced by those
countries, especially European nations which have abolished the death
penalty.

"We haven't executed any person convicted of murder in about 20 years but
the fact of the matter is the imposition of the death penalty by our
nation's court after a fair trial is on the statute books of Barbados,"
said Hackett.

"We don't believe any group of countries should now seek to tell us and
the international community that we must place a moratorium on something
that's part of our criminal justice procedures."

The imposition of the death penalty is seen as a human rights issue and
Barbados told a UN human rights panel some time ago that capital
punishment was the law of the land and most Barbadians wanted it to remain
on its books.

A resolution advocated by Europe and co-sponsored by Haiti was approved by
the UN Third Committee and is now to be considered by the full 192-member
General Assembly.

Almost every CARICOM country voted against the resolution, often citing
the same reason offered by the Barbados ambassador.

(source: The Nation Newspaper)