July 2
PHILIPPINES:
Manila lawmaker files bill reviving death penalty
A member of the House of Representatives from Metro Manila filed the first bill
for the revival of the controversial death penalty in support of the vow of
President Rodrigo "Rody" Duterte to stamp out corruption and rampant
criminality especially illegal drugs "in 3 to 6 months."
Congressman Ruffy Biazon of Muntinlupa City in Metro Manila said his bill
sought to amend the law banning the imposition of capital punishment which
Congress had passed in 2004.
"Filing the bill ahead will give the bill (an advantage) so it could be
referred to the (appropriate) House committee and hopefully, taken up ahead in
its agenda," Biazon pointed out.
Biazon was among the 90 House members who filed their pet bills on the first
day of the filing on Thursday before the House and the Senate would open the
16th Congress on July 25 for a joint session to hear Duterte deliver his first
state-of-nation address.
Duterte strongly urged the revival of the death penalty to strengthen his vow
for an all-out war on corruption and rampant criminality especially illegal
drugs which, he warned, were destroying particularly the youth of the land.
But even before Congress could act on its revival, officials said an
intensified police campaign resulted in the death of more than 60 suspected
"drug lords" and dealers since the May 9 election.
On Friday, police reported that at least 8 more "major" drug dealers - 6 from
Bulacan in Central Luzon and 1 each from Sorsogon in the Bicol Region and
Negros Oriental in the Visayas - were killed in "shoot-outs" a day after
Duterte took his oath as the country's 16th president.
Duterte pressed for the restoration of the death penalty despite strong
opposition from Pope Francis as well as local human rights advocates led by the
Commission on Human Rights (CHR) and the Catholic Bishops Conference of the
Philippines (CBCP). Without referring to any country, Pope Francis warned
against the return of capital punishment in his recent message sent to an
international conference against its revival which was hosted by Oslo in
Norway.
The Philippine Congress abolished the death penalty and replaced it with life
imprisonment which was imposed on "heinous" crimes like plunder, illegal drugs,
murder, kidnap-for-ransom, robbery-homicide and rape.
(source: The Gulf Today)
TRINIDAD:
Man to hang for killing probation officer
The mother of murdered Cedros probation officer, Krysta Lackpatsingh, broke
down in tears yesterday after the man accused of stabbing her daughter to death
12 years ago was found guilty and sentenced to hang.
It was after an hour and 20 minutes of deliberation that the 12-member jury in
the San Fernando First Assizes returned with a guilty verdict against Jason
Housten.
Asked by the court officer whether he wished to say anything before sentence is
passed, Housten, 36, said: "No, Sir."
As he was being escorted to prison, Housten, who claimed someone had threatened
to kill him and his brother if he did not confess to killing Krysta, 23, smiled
for photographers outside the court.
Speaking with reporters afterwards, Krysta's mother, Jade Lackpatsingh, called
on the Government to enforce the death penalty.
Wiping away tears, Lackpatsingh, who along with her husband Steve attended the
trial every day said: "I believe in the death penalty. I think that is why
Trinidad is the way it is now. People feel they can do what they want and get
away. She (Krysta) was young and had so much to live for."
She said her daughter, who was attached to the Point Fortin Magistrates Court,
had returned home early that fateful day to type up a report on the family's
computer because a computer had not yet been installed at work.
The parents, who found their daughter's body in a pool of blood at their Lime
Field Road home when they returned from work, said for a long time they avoided
walking in the area they found her body. "It felt like we walking on her," said
Jade.
After all these years, the parents, both teachers, said her room remained
untouched and her clothes were still in her drawers. The father said they
placed a table with a picture of Krysta in the area where she died. And every
time he passes he says "girl I hope you rest in peace."
He said every year on her death anniversary they would put a new ornament on
the table.
State attorneys Shabaana Shah and Stacy Laloo-Chong led evidence from 12
witnesses during the trial which started before Justice Carla Brown-Antoine in
May.
Housten confessed to the police, detailing how he forced his way into the
Lackpatsingh's home on January 20, 2004, and stabbed her more than 20 times.
He spoke about how he took a kitchen knife, stabbed her repeatedly as she
begged for her life. blood spilled out of her. He told police he went upstairs
where he He stole $1,500 from a purse and came back downstairs where he used a
wet towel to wipe off his bloody hand and foot prints.
Housten, who was represented by attorneys Rekha Ramjit and Gina Ramjohn, did
not deny giving the police oral and written statements.
However, he claimed his cellmate and fellow villager who was also detained by
police in connection with Krysta's murder, threatened to kill him if he did not
take the rap.
He said while they were in the station cell together the man told him what to
tell the police. Under cross-examination however, Housten admitted he made up
certain parts of the his statement, but he denied killing Krysta.
Among the officers involved in the investigations were ASP Paul, ASP Paloo,
Insp Flaveny, Cpl Ramtoole, Cpl Hood and others.
(source: Trinidad GUardian)
JAPAN:
Japan dances with the death penalty
Last week, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte announced his plans to
reinstate the death penalty, which was abolished in his country in 2006.
Duterte says he believes in retribution: If you kill someone, you deserve to
die.
Some people are shocked by this rationale, but they shouldn't be. The death
penalty has always been more or less about revenge, though it is sometimes
justified as a deterrent. The Japanese government has never clearly explained
its adoption of capital punishment except to say that most Japanese people want
it. In recent years, some have called for a nationwide debate on the death
penalty, including 1 justice minister who actually signed off on an execution
for the purpose of starting such a debate.
Recently, several major newspapers, including The Japan Times, published the
name of the man who was sentenced to death for 2 murders he committed in
Ishinomaki, Miyagi Prefecture, in 2010 as a minor. Making this name public
breaks a self-imposed rule that people arrested or convicted as minors will not
be identified publicly. The ostensible reason for this rule is that the suspect
has a chance at rehabilitation, which means he or she could re-enter society at
some future date. In the minor's case, some newspapers claimed that, since the
young man in question was condemned to death, there was no possibility of
rehabilitation, so it was OK to print his name.
This reasoning has always been used by the tabloids and weeklies, especially
Shukan Shincho, which has often published the names of people arrested for
murder as minors. Shincho's real reasons are cynical - they know if they print
the name, people will buy the magazine - but they explain the disclosure by
saying the public has a right to know, as if understanding the name of a boy
who killed someone would make readers better citizens. Regardless of one's
opinion of such revelations, the argument over whether or not it is ethical is
a sideshow to the main event: shallow, one-sided coverage of a capital case.
In journalist Keiko Horikawa's 2013 book about Norio Nagayama, who was
convicted of murdering 4 people in 1968 when he was 19 and executed in 1997,
she explains how the Supreme Court's reversal of a lower court's reduction of
Nagayama's sentence to life-in-prison gave rise to the so-called Nagayama
Criteria, which are used by judges to determine whether or not they should
impose the death penalty. Among these criteria are previous criminal record,
number of people killed, degree of remorse, age at the time of the crime,
impact on society, method of killing and the feelings of victims' families.
Though they have been referenced in court, experts say they have never
constituted a uniform judicial standard. In fact, the application of Nagayama
Criteria, especially those regarding victims' families, social impact and the
perceived "brutality" factor, tends to be determined by public sentiment rather
than the tenets of criminal justice.
Convicted murderers are now being sentenced to death based on considerations
that would not have led to capital punishment in the past. So while the number
of murders has dropped in the last few decades, the number of death sentences
has increased. Horikawa believes the change has come about through an effort to
make people feel "less guilty" about the death penalty.
When the lay judge system was implemented 7 years ago, it institutionalized
this effort by giving average people the power to put someone to death. First,
certain standards had to be allowed into court and emphasized, such as the
feelings of victims' families, who are now allowed to question defendants
before a verdict is reached, even if they have pleaded not guilty. In
Horikawa's book, 1 of the lay judges for the Ishinomaki case is quoted as
having said after the trial, "If the victim's family hadn't demanded it, I
wouldn't have voted for capital punishment."
In the March issue of Sekai magazine, Masayoshi Taguchi writes about how he
formed his group, the Lay Judge Community Club, made up of former lay judges
like himself, for the purpose of studying capital punishment so that future lay
judges would be able to make better decisions. Several members of LJCC heard
capital cases, and they say the only things they were told about the death
penalty during the trial is that the execution must take place within 6 months
of the sentence's finalization and that hanging is the method used.
The group sent a letter in February 2014 to the Justice Ministry asking it to
explain the "system," including how death-row inmates spend their days, why
Japan maintains the death penalty, why it chose hanging, how the ministry
decides when a person is to be put to death, and why condemned prisoners are
not informed of their execution until the morning it is to take place. The
ministry never answered the letter, despite follow-up phone calls and messages.
Taguchi writes that at his 1st post-execution press conference, Justice
Minister Mitsuhide Iwaki made a point of mentioning "the victims' families'
feelings," even though, according to the law, the death penalty is not supposed
to be used to "satisfy desires for revenge." At another press conference last
December, where Iwaki announced 2 executions - including that of Sumitoshi
Tsuda, whose death was decided by a member of the LJCC - a reporter for the
Asahi Shimbun asked him if the ministry will ever reply to the LJCC's letter.
Iwaki said they are still studying the matter, which in bureaucratese means,
"No, we will not."
The government doesn't want to talk about it and, for the most part, the media
doesn't either. Last year, during a news conference for a book she had just
published about the victims of Hiroshima, Horikawa said she started writing
books about capital punishment because it was a taboo subject for the
mainstream media. That's not entirely true. The media loves covering murder
cases from the standpoint of victims' families, who have their full attention.
When the purpose is retribution, no effort is too great. Understanding is
something else.
(source: Philip Brasor, The Japan Times)
BARBADOS----new death sentence:
Bynoe found guilty
Jamar Dewayne Bynoe, accused of the deaths of 6 women in the Campus Trendz
fire, has been found guilty on 6 counts of murder and sentenced to death by
hanging.
The verdict in the so-called Campus Trendz trial was handed down a short while
ago.
The 6 young women died in a fire at the former Tudor Street boutique following
an alleged robbery in September 2010.
(source: Barbados Today)
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