[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

July 14



GHANA:

2 death sentences in Tamale----Ghana is considered to be a democratic country 
that leads in human rights but unfortunately the entrenched clause in the 
constitution that allows the death penalty has become rampant, a human rights 
activist says.


The Tamale High Court has sentenced a 33 year old herdsman to death, the 2nd 
such sentencing in the past 2 weeks.

Ghana is considered to be a democratic country that leads in human rights but 
unfortunately the entrenched clause in the constitution that allows the death 
penalty has become rampant, a human rights activist says.

Ghana still has laws that allow the death penalty - it has become an entrenched 
clause only because the government nor presidency alone cannot take that away 
unless there is a referendum, Director of Amnesty International Ghana Lawrence 
Amesu says.

This week, the Tamale High Court sentenced a 33-year old Fulani herdsman to 
death by hanging.

The court, presided over by His Lordship Mr. Charles Gyamfi Danquah handed down 
the sentence of death after all 7 judges came out with an unanimous decision of 
guilty of murder.

The convict and the deceased were brothers and lived in the same house at Soma 
village near Tuna in the Sawla-Tuna-Kalba District of the Northern Region with 
other members of their family.

Ghanaweb reports that in November 2008, there was a family dispute which lead 
the convict to assault his siblings.

Later, the convict followed the deceased who was herding their father's cattle 
to the bush to graze where he stabbed him in ribs resulting in his death.

It was reported that when he realized he had killed his brother, he went home 
packed his belongings and left the village undetected, however the convict's 
father became suspicious about the disappearance of the deceased and after 
failing to find the deceased lodged a complaint with police.

Mumuni Adama was arrested in Kalba village while he attempted to escape with 
his wife. He then confessed to the police about killing his brother and led 
them to the body.

This sentence comes a week after a 22-year-old trader was also sentenced to 
death after being found guilty of murder by a 5-member jury at the Tamale High 
Court.

Zeila Sulemana was convicted and sentenced after stabbing nursing student 
Rawdia Aminu, in 2014 after the 2 argued.

(source: pulse.com.gh)






THAILAND:

Disabled man murder suspects plead not guilty in court


The 7 youths accused of killing a disabled bread deliveryman in the Chokchai 4 
neighborhood in May pleaded not guilty at the Criminal Court in their 1st trial 
this morning.

The suspects - including 6 young men aged 18-23 and their 19-year-old female 
friend - denied all 3 charges including murder, possession of knives, and 
intrusion of the bakery.

The next trial is set for Sept. 19.

Anantachai Chaidech, the lawyer who represents the victim's family, said the 
suspects' denial of the charges will benefit his side since the court can now 
consider giving them the highest punishment, which is death penalty, Post Today 
reported.

Previously, the family of the victim, Somkiat Srichan, 36, requested that the 
police charge the 7 suspects with 1st-degree murder, which is only punishable 
by death. That request was denied but, with the suspects' plea of not-guilty, 
that sentence could come back into play.

On May 1, the 7 suspects were arrested for allegedly taking part in killing 
Somkiat outside of the bread shop where he worked. The victim had reportedly 
been teased by 4 of the men, which led to an argument.

The 4 men then called 2 friends, who arrived with knives. Together, they 
allegedly beat and stabbed Somkiat, according to an eyewitness.

The suspects are brothers Arin and Peerapol Yodponganan, 20 and 21 
respectively, Monmanat Sangpho, 22, and Mek Polkraisorn, 19, Akkaradet 
Thatsana, 22, and an 18-year-old boy, whose identity was withheld.

Natnicha Ritlamlert, the 19-year-old girlfriend of 1 of the 6 suspects, turned 
herself in days later after a warrant was issued for her arrest. A witness said 
she cheered on the 6 assailants and yelled "Kill him!"

(source: coconuts.co)






PAKISTAN:

COAS approves death sentence of 12 terrorists


Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Raheel Sharif Thursday confirmed death 
sentence awarded by military courts to 12 terrorists.

According to Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR), the convicted terrorists 
included Muhammad Qayyum, Asif, Muhammad Bacha and Shahadat Hussain, Samaa 
reported.

The terrorists were involved in attacking security personnel and civilians, the 
ISPR said.

Pakistan reinstated the death penalty and established military courts as part 
of a crackdown after suffering its deadliest ever extremist attack, when gunmen 
stormed Army Public School in Peshawar in 2014 leaving more than 150 people 
dead.

(source: thenewstribe.com)

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

Flowers from the muck----A well-observed account of Pakistan's death penalty 
and how it works


Pakistan's death row is one of the grimmest places on earth. The sordid 
conditions of its condemned - stowed away for decades, 8 men to a 
120-square-foot cell, sustained on filthy gruel and constantly recontaminating 
one another with disease - are the least of its horrors. When this book begins 
in 2013, an estimated 8,000 people were awaiting execution. A former minister 
estimates that 2/3 were innocent. "Trials" is about a foreign lawyer's plunge 
into this swirling injustice. The surprise is the flowering of virtue that she 
finds at its centre.

Isabel Buchanan was somehow drawn to this mess. Just months after finishing her 
law degree in Scotland, she decided to learn Urdu, move to Lahore and bury 
herself beneath a mountain of files in a stifling room. She says modestly 
little about her reasons, save for a self-effacing remark about her love for 
Pakistani sweets.

The 1st pattern to emerge is the way Pakistan's penal system is wielded against 
British-raised expatriates who return to their homeland. Jealous neighbours 
easily suborn the police into arresting them. Ms Buchanan took up the victims' 
cases to provide them with legal aid. Her guide is another crusading misfit, 
Sarah Belal, whom she introduces with great charm ("one of Pakistan's least 
successful lawyers ... unemployed, depressed" and yet glamorous). Along the 
way, she cobbles together a handbook to a mad system.

Together, the 2 lawyers plough into a field of perversity. The police routinely 
begin their investigations by torturing suspects into unreliable confessions. 
This is so well known that Pakistan's courts have ruled statements made in 
police custody to be inadmissible as evidence, unless corroborated. So the 
torture goes on, in co-ordination with police who plant evidence to validate 
the forced confessions. In one case the same man is sentenced to death twice: 
once by hanging, once by firing squad. But the most perverse judgments arise 
from an unholy hybrid of antiquated British rules and Islamic law: the law 
against blasphemy. An Islamist reinterpretation of sharia demands the ultimate 
punishment, while colonial-era criminal procedures short-circuit traditional 
Islamic opportunities for apologies and mercy.

More than 1,200 people have been sentenced to death for blasphemy, but none has 
been executed. Ms Buchanan attributes that oddity to "a quiet, subtle act of 
objection" on the part of Pakistan's higher courts, which do what they can to 
lessen the law's damage. Instead, convicted blasphemers are murdered routinely 
outside the court system, as are those who might protect them. Yet many 
continue to brave the murderers' threats.

Other bravery shows itself through tenderness, as when an innocent prisoner 
devotes himself to comforting panicked men on their way to the gallows. Ms 
Buchanan dedicates her book to him. She manages to keep aloft several such 
stories at once, with a fine eye for machinery behind the scenes: like the 
black typewriters that judder under candlelight during a summertime blackout.

In an elegant final chapter, Ms Buchanan makes the point that Pakistan is 
hardly alone in subjecting Pakistanis to inhumane treatment. Ms Belal's ragtag 
team turns to arguing for the repatriation of Pakistani civilians dragged by 
American special forces across the border into Afghanistan and stored like meat 
in a locker at an American prison near Bagram. Its inmates have been denoted by 
serial numbers, and years of their lives have been stolen, on a mere guess that 
they may be terrorists.

Eventually the courts in Pakistan agree to recognise the prisoners near Bagram 
as people, and Ms Buchanan gives them their due. "It was Pakistan's legal 
system that championed fundamental rights where 2 great Western democracies 
[Britain and America] had denied them." In a triumph against appearances, some 
Pakistanis refuse to submit to pressure to dispense with the niceties of 
justice.

(source: The Economist)






PHILIPPINES:

'I'm not perfect but I'm no drug dealer': Australian man facing the death 
penalty in the Philippines for 'selling cookie monster ecstasy' pleads his 
innocence - as his girlfriend expects their 1st child----Damian Berg was 
arrested in Manila in June accused of selling ecstasy; The engineer from 
Adelaide protested his innocence to Daily Mail Australia


An Adelaide man arrested for allegedly selling 'cookie monster' drugs in the 
Philippines has pleaded his innocence from jail as he faces the death penalty.

Damian Berg, 34, spoke exclusively to Daily Mail Australia via his pregnant 
girlfriend to insist he was the victim of a set-up on Thursday.

Protesting that he did not attempt to sell a horde of blue ecstasy tablets in 
Manila, as accused by Philippine authorities, Mr Berg said he was 'not perfect' 
but had never been 'a drug dealer'.

He instead laid the blame squarely with Canadian native Jeremy Eaton who was 
also taken into custody in June when police claim to have found them with 170 
of the pills.

'It's lies,' he said of the allegations against him.

'Marvie and I had been arguing while I was at work,' he said, explaining why he 
was not at the couple's shared home but at a hotel nearby when he was arrested 
with Eaton on June 21.

Mr Berg, 34, claims he was named to police by a local drug addict who once saw 
him drinking in a bar with his co-accused.

The engineer said he had no reason to engage in criminal activity after finding 
work and a happy life with his girlfriend, who is pregnant with their 1st 
child, since leaving Australia several years ago.

'I was lucky to secure the role in the Philippines as Marvie and I intended to 
start a family.

'Why would I do this stuff ? No need. I am not perfect but I am no drug 
dealer.'

If found guilty of drug dealing, Mr Berg could face the death penalty under a 
new, harsher crime crackdown introduced by the country's new leader, Rodrigo 
Duerte.

Duerte has a notoriously tough stance against drugs, once claiming he would 
kill his own son if he ever caught him taking them.

Speaking to Daily Mail Australia upon his arrest last month, Ms Zanelucas broke 
down as she contemplated life without him.

'We were planning on getting married until this happened,' she said.

'We had a plan and now this everyone is saying he's a drug dealer and I said: 
"What the hell". It's not true. I'm not scared, we know the truth. He is a good 
man. He doesn't belong there.

'I am talking to his family on Skype. As of now I am OK. I am strong, I have 
the support of my family.'

She added her partner was not close friends with Eaton but that the pair were 
merely acquaintances.

Ms Zanelucas, who is 29, is due to give birth to their 1st son in November.

Mr Berg's parents, who remain in Adelaide, said in June they were aware he had 
been taken into custody.

'What we do know is that Damian is in custody in Manila and is being treated 
OK.

'It will take time before his case is heard, and until then we can't comment 
any more. As a family, we dearly love him and will be supporting him as much as 
we can,' they said.

The 34-year-old's case has been postponed for a month, leaving him to wait in a 
Manila prison until facing trial when proceedings resume.

The Department of Trade and Foreign Affairs is providing consular assistance to 
the Berg family, a spokesman said last month.

'The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade is providing consular assistance 
to an Australian man arrested in the Philippines, in accordance with the 
Consular Services Charter.

'Due to privacy obligations, we are unable to provide further comment.'

(source: dailymail.co.uk)