[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide
April 4 BANGLADESH: Nizami's hearing not this week Condemned war criminal Motiur Rahman Nizami's petition seeking review of his death penalty has been lined up for hearing at the Appellate Division next week following a time petition by the defence. A 3-member bench of the Appellate Division led by Chief Justice Surendra Kumar Sinha set the new date yesterday morning. Defence lawyer SM Shahjahan said they had sought six-week time for the hearing due to some personal difficulties of Nizami's principal lawyer Khandaker Mahbub Hossain. But the apex court said it would hold the hearing next week, Shahjahan said. However, the court did not fix any specific day for the hearing. Jamaat-e-Islami chief Nizami filed the petition on March 29 seeking acquittal from all the proven charges. The death penalty of Nizami was upheld by the apex court on January 6 on charges of masterminding the killing of intellectuals and for his involvement in two incidents of mass murders of over 500 people in Pabna in 1971. (source: dhakatribune.com) SINGAPORE: Malaysian convicted of murder in Singapore to know his fate Tuesday The family of Kho Jabing are anxiously waiting to see if the Singapore Court of Appeal will decide if he will be executed or have his sentence commuted for a murder he committed 8 years ago. His mother Lenduk Baling and his sister Jumai Kho arrived in Singapore on Sunday from Sarawak for the judgement, which is likely to be delivered on Tuesday. "We are very anxious. We can only hope for the best," Jumai told The Star Online in a phone interview on Monday. Kho Jabing, 31, who is from Ulu Baram, Sarawak faces the gallows for killing a Chinese construction worker with a tree branch back in 2008 during a robbery attempt. He was scheduled to be executed on Nov 6 last year, but received a stay after his lawyer filed a motion raising points of law about the way the case was handled. Jumai said she and her mother had met Jabing earlier on Monday, who also hoped for his death sentence to be commuted. Jabing was sentenced to death in 2010, but following revisions to Singapore's mandatory death penalty laws in August 2013, Singpore's high court sentenced him to life imprisonment and 24 strokes of the cane instead. The prosecution challenged the decision before the court of appeal, which reinstated Jabing death sentence in a 3-2 majority decision earlier last year. On Oct 19, Singapore president Tony Tan rejected a clemency petition before a stay of execution by the court of appeal. In 2013, the Singapore government abolished the mandatory death penalty and gave judges discretion to choose between a death sentence or life imprisonment with caning in murder and certain drug trafficking cases. (source: The Star) VIETNAM: 14 face charges in Vietnam for trafficking 280 kg of heroin to China Vietnamese police are urging charges be filed against 14 people for allegedly trafficking 280 kg of heroin to China on 22 different occasions, earning more than VND10 billion (US$450,000). Investigators from the Ministry of Public Security submitted a report to the prosecutor's office Sunday, naming the suspects led by Chu Van Vien, 33. The ring members, aged between 25 and 40, carried the drugs from Son La Province on the Laos border. Police caught 2 members of the gang in Hanoi and the neighboring Hoa Binh Province in December 2014 with around 15 kg of heroin. They told the police they were carrying the drugs for a Chinese woman and Chu Dinh Tuyen, Vien's brother who acted as his assistant after quitting his job as a vendor selling agriculture produce across the border. Vietnam has some of the world's toughest drug laws. The production or sale of 100 grams of heroin or 300 grams of other illegal narcotics is punishable by death. Those convicted of possessing or smuggling more than 600 grams of heroin or more than 2.5 kilograms of methamphetamine also face the death penalty. (source: Thanh Nien News) INDIA: Need political rights, Indira Jaisingh at JNU The right to hold a political opinion different from that of a ruling party is "more endangered" than the right to free speech, said lawyer Indira Jaisingh. She was addressing students in Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), during their 'Azadi' lecture series, on Saturday. The 1st woman Additional Solicitor General of India gave a lecture on the topic 'What does fidelity to the Constitution mean'. After the nationalism classes in the university, the JNU Students' Union is organising 'Azadi' lecture series where noted lawyers, academicians and activists have been addressing students on a range of topics. "While I believe that the right to free speech is endangered in today's context, I feel that the right to hold a political opinion which is different from that of the ruling party is even more endangered. I reject the interpretation of the Constitution placed by BJP
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, GA., FLA., ALA., LA., OHIO, USA
April 4 TEXASnew execution date Execution date set for killer in Houston vice officer's death A Harris County judge on Monday signed a death warrant for 58-year-old man who fatally shot a Houston police officer in 1988. State District Judge Denise Collins set Sept. 14 as an execution date for Robert Mitchell Jennings who was convicted of killing vice officer Elston Howard at an adult bookstore. Howard's mother, 83-year-old Era Mae Howard, watched the proceedings with HPD interim chief Martha Montalvo and several other officers. Before the brief hearing, the 2 women shared a laugh because the octogenarian use to babysit Montalvo's children, 1 of whom grew up to be an HPD officer. Harris County District Attorney Devon Anderson also attended the hearing to see the proceedings against Jennings, who appeared in a yellow jail uniform. Jennings and his co-defendant David Lee Harvell, were robbing their 2nd adult bookstore on July 19, 1988 when Jennings went in to one alone on Richmond, court records show. Jennings saw Howard, who was wearing an HPD jacket, arresting the store clerk for municipal violations and shot him twice. Jennings shot the officer a 3rd time after he fell and then robbed the store. After he fled, Jennings told Harvell he shot a "security guard" and Harvell tried to get him out of the car, court records show. When Jennings refused, Harvell shot him in the hand. Harvell was later convicted of aggravated robbery and sentenced to death. (source: Houston Chronicle) *** Executions under Greg Abbott, Jan. 21, 2015-present18 Executions in Texas: Dec. 7, 1982present-536 Abbott#scheduled execution date-nameTx. # 19-April 6--Pablo Vasquez-537 20-May 11---Terry Edwards-538 21-June 2---Charles Flores539 22-June 21--Robert Roberson---540 23-July 14--Perry Williams541 24-July 27--Rolando Ruiz--542 25-August 23Robert Pruett-543 26-September 14-Robert Jennings---544 (sources: TDCJ & Rick Halperin) GEORGIAimpending execution The Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles has set a clemency hearing for a death row inmate scheduled to be put to death next week The board announced Monday that it will hear from advocates for Kenneth Fults on April 11. Fults was convicted of killing Cathy Bounds, who was shot 5 times in the back of her head. Prosecutors say Fults killed Bounds after breaking into her house during a weeklong crime spree in January 1996. Fults is scheduled to die April 12 by injection of the barbiturate pentobarbital at the state prison in Jackson. The parole board is the only entity in Georgia that can commute a death sentence. Georgia has already executed 3 other inmates this year. (source: Associated Press) FLORIDA: Man who admitted killing his wife and five children by slitting their throats should be spared death penalty because of traumatic brain injury, his lawyers argue A Florida man who admitted to killing his wife and 5 children more than 6 years ago suffered a traumatic brain injury that should keep him from the death penalty, his lawyers now argue. Mesac Damas, 39, has been in custody since 2009 after he confessed to murdering wife Guerline, 32, and children Michzach, 9, Marven, 6, Maven, 5, Megan, 3, and 11-month-old Morgan. The 6 victims were found in the family's North Naples home with stab wounds and their throats slashed on September 18. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty. Damas' mental health, in addition to challenges to Florida's death penalty laws, have delayed his case going to trial for years. His competency and mental health could be cited as 'mitigating factors' during sentencing that may be significant enough to keep the jury from sending Damas to death row, according to Naples Daily News. James Ermacora, one of Damas' attorneys, would not elaborate on the traumatic brain injury but said the claim was made using information from an expert report. The filings claim that Damas has a 'long and documented history of mental illness, beginning even in his youth in Haiti'. It also states that both sides from Damas' family show evidence of 'alcohol abuse, spousal abuse, and serious mental illness on both genetic sides'. The lawyers claim records from hospitals and prisons back up these claims, and Ermacora plans to travel to Haiti to obtain more evidence of Damas' history of mental illness. Guerline Damas, who had been married to her husband for 10 years, and her children were discovered dead after a family member asked police to conduct a welfare check. Damas' car was found at Miami International Airport, where he had boarded a 1-way flight to Haiti
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide
April 4 INDIA: Nirbhaya case: SC begins hearing on death convicts' plea Almost 2 years after staying execution of death sentence of 4 convicts in the December, 2012 Nirbhaya rape and murder case, the Supreme Court on Monday began final hearing on their appeal challenging their conviction and sentence in the case. The convicts -- Vinay Sharma (23), Akshay Thakur (31), Mukesh (29) and Pawan Gupta (22) -- were awarded the death sentence by a trial court in September 2013 and 6 moths later, the Delhi high court upheld their conviction and sentence. All the convicts approached the Supreme Court in 2014, which stayed their execution. A bench of Justices Dipak Misra, V Gopala Gowda and Kurian Joseph said it would examine all evidences in the case to dispel allegations made by the convicts that they were not given enough opportunity to defend themselves in the lower court and HC. "Our approach would be to hear the case as original trial. We would go through all evidences in the case and analyse them. We would appreciate evidences as trial court so that there remains no grievances," the bench said. The bench said the testimony of Nirbhaya's male friend, who was with her on that fateful night, was the most crucial evidence in the case. It asked the counsel for the convicts to first argue on the testimony of her friend who was the sole eyewitness in the case. Advocate M L Sharma, appearing for Mukesh and Pawan, told the bench that the order passed by the trial court and Delhi HC in the case was wrong and the extreme punishment was meted out to them under media and political pressure. He contended that the judgement be set aside as there was no "substance or material piece of evidence" and there were contradictions in the depositions of the victim and her friend about the offence and the offenders. Disputing the veracity of the dying declaration of the victim, he contended that she was not fit enough to record her statement and hence, the statement made through gestures cannot be relied upon. The hearing remained inconclusive and would resume on April 8. The Delhi High Court had on March 13, 2014 upheld their conviction and award of death penalty by terming the offence as "extremely fiendish" and "unparallelled in the history of criminal jurisprudence" and had said the "exemplary punishment" was the need of the hour. The 23-year-old paramedic was brutally assaulted and gangraped by 6 people in a moving bus in south Delhi on December 16, 2012 and thrown out of the vehicle with her male friend. She died in a Singapore hospital on December 29. Prime accused in the case, Ram Singh, was found dead in Tihar Jail and the trial against him was abated. The 6th accused, a juvenile, was sentenced to a maximum of 3 years in a reformation home by the juvenile justice board on August 31, 2013. (source: The Times of India) ** Is It Time To Do Away With Death Penalty In India? In 1967, the Law Commission of India had reported: "Having regard, however, to the conditions in India, to the variety of social upbringing of its inhabitants, to the disparity in the level of morality and education in the country, to the vastness of its area, to the diversity of its population and to the paramount need for maintaining law and order in the country at the present juncture, India cannot risk the experiment of abolition of capital punishment." However, due to the recent support in favour of abolishing this punishment from the Indian legal system and the trend being observed in most of the countries around the world, the Law Commission of India in 2013 decided to review the issue once again. This issue, however, is not a new one. One of the most controversial and heatedly debated topics during the Constituent Assembly debates was whether or not the death penalty should be retained in the constitution of Independent India? One of the main voices for abolishing the death penalty was the man who is often referred to as the architect of the Constitution - DR. B. R. Ambedkar. Ambedkar pointed out the inherent violence that is attached to a punishment like the death penalty and stated that "people may not follow non-violence in practice but they certainly adhere to the principle of non-violence as a moral mandate and thus the state ought to observe it as far as it possibly can," implying that a state must practice non-violence if it wants its citizens to condone violence. However, Ambedkar's views and suggestions were ignored by the Assembly and the death penalty was retained as a legal form of punishment in the penal code. Although the death penalty was retained in the legal system it has not been a common form of punishment. In Mithu vs. State of Punjab (1983) the Supreme Court observed that "in the whole of IPC there is only 1 section (Section 303) where death is described as the only punishment for murder by person under a sentence for impr
