[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

April 24



CHINA:

Vault guard gets death sentence


A Hunan Province court has sentenced a former vault guard to death for
stealing more than 5.5 million yuan (US$686,042) from his employer in
Pingjiang County.

The sentence for Hu Guiding, then a vault guard at the county post office,
was suspended for 2 days. He stole the fund on August 17, 2005, with the
help of his nephew, Xu Yingchun, who was sentenced to 6 years and fined
10,000 yuan. Hu's niece, Xu Yichun, got a 2-year jail term, suspended for
3 years, and fined 10,000 yuan for helping Hu hide the stolen funds.

(source: Shanghai Daily)






PHILIPPINES:

Death penalty needs second work


"The power to forgive under both the Bible and the Constitution can change
a nation for good especially at these times that we cry for compassion and
reconciliation," President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo said as she granted a
general commutation of death sentence to a life imprisonment to over 1,000
death convicts in the spirit of Easter Sunday is a decision in consonance
with the Catholic Churchs teaching, firm on its pro-life stance even for
those hardened criminals sentenced to death by lethal injection has
appeased and lauded the majority but to those victims families and
relatives, a misery.

In the province, former Regional Trial Court Judge Joven Costales, a
native of Naguilian, La Union who has been a government prosecutor for
more than 28 years was reputed to have promulgated the most number of
heinous crimes in history of the countrys judiciary and was also dubbed as
"hanging judge" in Pangasinan, has sent 14 persons convicted of heinous
crimes to death penalty.

Among the cases where he handed death penalty include gruesome murder of a
certain doctor named April Santos Duque, a dermatologist who was hit by a
hammer on her head, repeatedly stubbed then burned her body. Another one
was fathers who repeatedly raping their minor daughters and many other
heinous crimes.

Quoting his answer when interviewed if death penalty deters crime, he
said, "it may or may not, let us have more convictions," Judge Costales
opined. The clamor to repeal death penalty has not died down due to
rampant killings and presence of criminal syndicates not only in the
country but also to some parts of the world, has resulted to grave
miseries of victims and concerned families.

To the faithfuls and Christians here they said, "we believe that learning
to forgive without compromising criminal justice would be a good start for
the nation to move."

At this point, this is an urgent matter to be studied by our lawmakers to
decide the fate of this law, whether to re-impose it or not if proven to
be not an effective deterrent factor in the commission of crimes.

(source: Commentary, PIA)

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

FLAG lawyer confident on abolition of death penalty


Free Legal Assistance Group (FLAG) lawyer Atty. Pablito Sanidad is hopeful
that commutation of the death penalty shall bring to an end the quest for
its abolition.

This is following the announcement of the President Gloria
Macapagal-Arroyo on the commutation of death penalty to life imprisonment
certifying as urgent the bill seeking the final repeal of the death
penalty.

According to Atty. Sanidad, the death penalty should have been dead and
buried when the 1987 Constitution was adopted. He added that in 1987 all
death penalties were automatically reduced to reclusion perpetua, or life
imprisonment.

Sanidad further explained that the death penalty has never been proven as
an effective deterrent against criminality. In fact, he claimed majority
of the nations around the globe abandoned capital punishment which
likewise is supported by the United Nations under the Statement of the
Declaration of Rights.

He said that the Supreme Court is opposed to death penalty citing its
decision last 2004 refusing to sustain the death sentence of about 72
percent of the elevated cases.

Sanidad brushed aside comments of some quarters that the decision of PGMA
to commute the death sentences was a recent development, or that she had
succumbed to pressure from the church or from human rights groups neither
did she gain any political advantage for her commutation announcement as
she is now being attacked by pro-death sectors. This proof of her pro-life
stand is a deep-seated personal belief and conviction, Sanidad stressed.

(source: PIA News)

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

Police fear hike in crime rate if death penalty is lifted


Police Provincial Director Melvin Ramon Buenafe is apprehensive the crime
rate in Negros Oriental and other parts of the country might increase if
the proposal to lift the death penalty law pushed through.

Buenafe said the proposal, if approved, could lead to more killings
because relatives of victims might put the law in their own hands because
of the perception that the country's justice system could not punish those
responsible of heinous crimes.

"Ang masama, mangyayari ang tinatawag na 'ubusan ng lahi' dahil sa wala na
silang maasahan na maghiganti laban sa kanilang kaapihan," said Buenafe.

Asked if the death penalty could prevent criminals, he said, "2 plus 1
equals 1.

"Kapag ganyan ang analogy, kayo na ang sumagot."

He explained that if 1 of 2 criminals were sentenced to death, the other
could be deterred.

On the other hand Dumaguete City police chief Deonardo Carlos said the PNP
job was only to enforce the law.

"Kami naman sa police tagapagpatupad lamang ng batas at nanghuhuli ng mga
kriminal, bahala na ang batas kung anong parusa ilalapat sa isang
kriminal," Carlos said.

For his part, Governor George Arnaiz reiterated his stand for the death
penalty saying he preferred it to vigilante groups.

Arnaiz said his position was to punish the guilty in accordance with the
law.

But, he clarified the President has the option to exercise her rights
under the Constitution and that she has the prerogative to commute a death
sentence.

Earlier Dumaguete City Vice Mayor William Ablong said he supported the
proposal of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to repeal the death penalty
law saying it was not a deterrent against crimes.

"Since the law was passed during the term of President Fidel Ramos, crimes
have not lessened," the vice mayor said adding, "Man has no right to take
a life. Only God can do that."

Ablong is active in church-related and church-based activities in the city
and in Negros Oriental.

(source: Sun Star)