[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

Sept. 1



IRAN----executions

Man Charged With Rape Hanged in Rajai Shahr Prison----Prison authorities in 
Rajai Shahr break routine and execute a prisoner on a Monday rather than the 
usual Wednesday.



A 29-year-old man who was sentenced to death for the charge of rape was 
reportedly hanged at Karaj's Rajai Shahr Prison. According to a report by the 
state-run news outlet, Iran, the execution of the man, who was only identified 
as "Morad", was carried out on the morning of Monday August 28. The report says 
"Morad" burglarized the house of a 62-year-old woman whom he raped.

In addition to the death sentence, the prisoner was also issued a 10-year 
prison term and 74 lashes for the charge of theft, and a 1-year prison term for 
the charge of beating up a police officer.

Executions in Rajai Shahr Prison are typically carried out on Wednesdays, but 
"Morad" was hanged on a Monday.

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

Unidentified Prisoner Hanged in Public



An unidentified prisoner who was sentenced to death on the charge of "raping a 
married woman" was hanged in public in Bandar Abbas while a crowd of people 
watched.

According to a report by the state-run news agency, Mehr, the public hanging 
sentence of the man was carried out on the morning of Thursday August 31. The 
report says the prisoner was also charged with kidnapping and armed robbery and 
was issued prison and lashing sentences for those charges.

The research of Iran Human Rights shows 34 people were hanged in public in Iran 
in 2016; and an audience of hundreds of people, including children, were 
present for most of these hangings. Human rights activists and informed membes 
of civil society have always severely criticized this issue.

(source for both: Iran Human Rights)

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

Urgent Action



PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE SENTENCED TO DEATH

On 27 August a Revolutionary Court in Tehran sentenced spiritual 
teacher???Mohammad Ali Taheri???to death for "spreading corruption on earth" 
for establishing the spiritual group Erfan-e Halgheh. He has been held in 
solitary confinement for over 6 years.

Write a letter, send an email, call, fax or tweet:

* Urging the Iranian authorities to quash Mohammad Ali Taheri's conviction and 
death sentence and release him immediately and unconditionally, as he is a 
prisoner of conscience targeted solely for the peaceful exercise of his rights 
to freedoms of belief, expression and association;

* Reminding them that, under international human rights law, the death penalty 
may only be used for "the most serious crimes", which international bodies have 
interpreted as being limited to crimes involving intentional killings, and that 
the charges brought against him do not meet this threshold;

* Calling on them to order an independent and impartial investigation into his 
prolonged solitary confinement, which violates the absolute prohibition of 
torture and other ill-treatment, and bring those responsible to justice;

* Expressing concern that, in violation of the legal prohibition of double 
jeopardy, he was tried three times in relation to the same peaceful activities

Friendly reminder: If you send an email, please create your own instead of 
forwarding this one!

Contact these 2 officials by 12 October, 2017:

Head of the Judiciary

Ayatollah Sadegh Larijani

c/o Public Relations Office Number 4

2 Azizi Street intersection

Tehran, Islamic Republic of Iran

Salutation: Your Excellency

H.E. Gholamali Khoshroo

Permanent Representative of the Islamic Republic of Iran to the United Nations

622 Third Avenue, 34th Floor

New York, NY 10017

Phone: (212) 687-2020 I Fax: (212) 867-7086

Email: iran at un.int

Salutation: Your Excellency

(source: Amnesty International)








MALAYSIA:

Malaysian death judge who sentenced Kiwi to hang said he was reluctant servant



30 years ago today Kiwi Lorraine Cohen became the first white woman to be 
sentenced to hang in Malaysia. Today we look at what was described as a 
"sensational" sentencing after she was caught trying to smuggle heroin out of 
the country.

When Lorraine Cohen was sentenced to die, the Malaysian hanging judge said he 
was a "reluctant but obedient" servant of the country's lawmakers.

On hearing that she faced the gallows, Cohen reportedly remained standing in 
the High Court dock, staring blankly at the judge for several seconds, before 
an official told her to sit.

"By the time sentence was passed on [her son] Aaron 15 minutes later, Lorraine 
was in tears. Mother and son clasped each other's hands tightly," the New 
Straits Times wrote of the hearing, which was held on September 1, 1987.

The Auckland mother and son had been caught at a Malaysian airport trying to 
smuggle heroin out of the country in their underwear in 1985.

Lorraine - who died in 2014, aged in her early 70s - and her son were charged 
with trafficking.

The trial judge accepted that Aaron, but not Lorraine, was an addict at the 
time of their arrest. The charge against Aaron, who was found with a smaller 
amount of heroin than his mother, was reduced to possession. He was sentenced 
to a whipping and life imprisonment.

The mother's sentence was reduced, on appeal, to life imprisonment after a 
judge accepted the 140g of heroin found on her was for her own use.

Both were pardoned - at the 3rd attempt - and released in 1996, after more than 
11 years in prison.

At the sentencing, Justice Mohamed Dzaiddin Haji Abdullah told the court that 
Malaysia's death sentence for heroin trafficking was well known, the New 
Straits Times reported.

Lorraine, "being no stranger to Malaysia, cannot complain that she did not know 
the law and the penalty for trafficking".

"Every visitor who comes to Malaysia must have read the warning boldly stated 
on the embarkation cards and the billboards at all entry points. Therefore, to 
say that the warning did not actually explain the meaning of trafficking is no 
excuse."

"Mandatory sentence is one field of the criminal [law] where my function as a 
judge can be described as 'mechanical' because we judges become the reluctant 
but obedient servants of the lawmakers.

"Accordingly, I sentence [Lorraine] to death by hanging."

To Aaron, who had been found with 34.6g of heroin, the judge said: "You may 
consider yourself very lucky to escape the gallows by the skin of your teeth, 
so to speak. I hope you will learn a bitter lesson for the great risk you have 
taken in this case."

Anyone found with 15g of more of heroin is considered a dealer under Malaysian 
law.

While in prison, Lorraine was diagnosed with breast cancer and treated in 
hospital. The disease returned years later, but in the months before her death, 
she told the Herald on Sunday that she was free of cancer.

She was also free of drugs, but this remained a struggle.

"It's very hard. It's always in your head. You can clean your body up but 
getting it out of your brain - you're always looking for that first time again, 
which never happens."

Aucklander Charles Chan, who in 1987 was associate editor of Malaysian 
newspaper the Star, recalls that, by the country's standards, the case was not 
controversial.

"It was sensational; it was the 1st time a white woman was sentenced to 
hanging.

"I think in general people accepted she was sentenced correctly because other 
people were similarly sentenced to death. The death sentence was mandatory. 
They would be upset if she was exempted while other people were given the death 
sentence."

Australians Brian Chambers and Kevin Barlow were hanged in Malaysia in 1986 
after being convicted of heroin trafficking.

(source: New Zealand Herald)








SCOTLAND:

Barlinnie: The men who were hanged and their crimes: Carntyne cop killer John 
Caldwell



CARNTYNE cop-killer John Caldwell features in the latest of our special crime 
series.

Evening Times crime reporter Stacey Mullen has researched the stories of 10 
judicial executions in Glasgow between 1946 and 1960... the men who were hanged 
at Barlinnie

IT was the 'desperate and callous' murder which shocked the city - a retired 
detective sergeant gunned down outside his neighbour's home in Carntyne.

James Straiton, 61, left his Edinburgh Road home and ran to the aid of his 
neighbour who was being burgled by the gunmen.

They turned on him after he asked them to give themselves up and he was 
brutally gunned down so they could make their escape.

In a story covering the murder in 1946, we reported: "He died from a bullet 
wound within a few minutes, while his assailants, firing wildly in a headlong 
flight, vanished into the darkness, despite a valiant effort by the driver and 
conductor of a passing bus to intercept them."

Evening Times:

With gunmen on the loose in the city of Glasgow, this murder on March 26, was 
at the forefront of the top detectives of that day's mind - and a major manhunt 
was launched.

That probe started with a key piece of evidence one of the bandits had left 
behind - their shoes. They were found in the garden by police and a description 
of the footwear was issued in a bid to catch those responsible for the murder.

Cops also started their investigation with the theory that one or both of the 
gunmen had made their escape by getting on a tramcar in the Duke Street or 
South Carntyne areas.

But aside from finding those responsible, police officers had to say goodbye to 
one of their own.

Evening Times:

The funeral of Straiton, who had work for the Eastern Division of Glasgow 
Police, brought the East End of the city to a standstill.

"Bagpipes and crepe-covered drums of Glasgow Police Pipe Band played a lament," 
as the funeral cortege headed out of Edinburgh Road.

We also reported: "Hundreds of neighbours stood respectfully by the roadside, 
men doffing hats and caps, and the women bowing their heads.

"The dead man's widow, leaning heavily on the arm of a daughter, came to the 
door of her trim little villa to catch a last glimpse of the flower-covered 
coffin as it was placed in the hearse."

While respects were made to Straiton, officers continued their manhunt and 
issued an appeal for items which were missing from the house where the murder 
took place.

Investigators then got the break they needed and on April 1, 1946 we reported 
of John Caldwell's 1st court appearance - with a 15-year-old boy attending the 
city's juvenile court.

Caldwell, 20, had served in the army and was arrested by top detectives at a 
house in Bridgeton's Fielden Street when he was in bed. Cops arrived at 
property in the early hours of the morning having cracked the case.

Lord Stevenson passed the death sentence on Caldwell with his hanging at 
Barlinnie announced to take place.

He was found guilty by a jury on several charges after an absence of just 50 
minutes. He did not show any emotion as he was taken below to the cells - 
though his sister sobbed bitterly as the death sentence was read out. The jury 
recommended that he should be shown mercy on account of his age.

On the day of Caldwell's death, the Evening Times revealed exclusively how 
officers nabbed their man through, among several other things, a fragment of 
thumb print on a glass he had left at the scene of another robbery.

Evening Times:

Only a few men were present outside Barlinnie prison when the notice was pinned 
to its doors confirming that the execution of John Caldwell had been carried 
out.

He had killed a man who had served the city as a police officer. But his victim 
was honoured in the best way possible, by Glasgow cops nabbing their killer 
through some good old detective work.

(source: Evening Times)








NORTH KOREA:

N. Korean court sentences S. Korean reporters, newspaper chairmen to death: 
KCNA----Journalists reportedly committed "capital" crime by writing about 
"North Korean Confidential" book



The DPRK Central Court has sentenced 2 reporters and the chairmen of 2 South 
Korean newspapers to "capital punishment" for reporting on the release of a 
newly translated book about North Korea, the state-run Korean Central News 
Agency (KCNA) reported on Thursday.

A spokesperson for the Central Court of the DPRK condemned the Chosun Ilbo and 
the Dong-A Ilbo for reporting on the book "North Korea Confidential: Private 
Markets, Fashion Trends, Prison Camps, Dissenters and Defectors," a Korean 
language version of which was published in mid-August.

"The puppet conservative newspapers 'Dong-A Ilbo' and 'Chosun Ilbo' recently 
committed hideous crime of seriously insulting the dignity of the DPRK by using 
dishonest contents carried by a propaganda book 'North Korea Confidential'," 
the KCNA quoted the spokesperson as having said.

"The Central Court of the DPRK declares that the Dong-A Ilbo journalist Son Hyo 
Rim and Director General Kim Jae Ho and Chosun Ilbo journalist Yang Ji Ho and 
Director General Pang Sang Hun will be sentenced to capital punishment under 
the DPRK Criminal Code," it added.

The court said it has "seriously warned" the outlets "will be made to pay a 
high price" for the work.

"Now they have reached the state of slandering and insulting even the 
inviolable name of our country and its national emblem."

The title of the Korean version of the book translates to "Capitalist Republic 
of Korea" and a design on its cover replaces the red star in the DPRK national 
emblem with a U.S. dollar mark.

"Article 60 of the DPRK Criminal Code stipulates that those who insulted the 
dignity of the DPRK from the anti-state purpose shall be sentenced even to 
maximum punishment including death, depending on the severity of the 
perpetration," KCNA said in an English-language version of the article.

The North Korean outlet said authors James Pearson and Daniel Tudor had written 
a "propaganda book" based on the "ludicrous statements of the riff-raffs 
including rubbish defectors 2 years ago."

KCNA criticized the book for its "sophistries which slandered atrociously, 
distorted and fabricated the DPRK reality saying 'the lives of the North 
Koreans are 100% capitalist'."

The book was released in English in 2015 by Tuttle, a Vermont, U.S.-based 
publisher which specializes in works on Asia.

Other, more left-leaning South Korean outlets, including the Hankyoreh, the 
Hankook Ilbo, and the Kyunghyang Shinmun also covered the book's release, but 
are not mentioned in the North Korean statement.

The North said the Chosun Ilbo and the Dong-A Ilbo made "all kinds of abusive 
languages blindly" in reporting on the book.

The DPRK court appears to have taken issue with several quotes from the book 
cited by the Dong-A Ilbo, including: "North Korea is a country where the power 
of money is stronger than the capitalist country", "young people without mobile 
phone are treated as 'loser' in Pyongyang," and "a person with a lot of money 
can marry a person of high status at any time."

The North said the "criminals... hold no right to appeal," saying that 
punishment "will be carried out any moment and at any place without going 
through any additional procedures."

"We will track down to the end those who masterminded and manipulated hideous 
provocations of slandering and insulting the dignity of the DPRK and mete out 
death to them."

South Korea's Ministry of Unification (MOU) on Thursday said that Seoul 
"strongly condemned" the North's "preposterous threats."

"The menace to normal reporting activities of journalists is a serious threat 
to freedom of the press and an act of intervening in domestic affairs," the MOU 
said in a spokesperson's statement. "...it does not help in developing the 
inter-Korean relations that should be based on respect for the other side."

"[We] gravely warn North Korea to immediately stop the threats to our people."

Thursday's statement is not the 1st time in recent months that a North Korean 
judicial body has sentenced a South Korean citizen to death in absentia.

In June, the Ministry of People's Security and the Central Public Prosecutors 
Office announced it would "impose [the] death penalty" on former President Park 
Geun-hye and former director of the National Intelligence Service (NIS) Lee 
Byung-ho.

In a statement carried by KCNA, the 2 institutions called on the government of 
South Korea to hand over the 2 former officials so their sentence may be 
carried out.

The ruling was a response to what North Korea claimed was a failed U.S.-ROK 
assassination plot against current leader Kim Jong Un in April, which it 
alleged was planned by Park and Lee.

(source: nknews.org)








INDIA:

Mumbai: TADA court convicts Abu Salem aide of Pradeep Jain murder



More than 20 years after the sensational murder of builder Pradeep Jain, the 
Special Terrorist and Disruptive Activities Prevention Act (TADA) court 
convicted gangster Riyaz Ahmad Iqbal Ahmad Siddiqui of the crime. The same 
court had in 2015 sentenced underworld don Abu Salem and his driver to life 
imprisonment for the murder.

Brother recalls

Pradeep was murdered in March 1995 to teach a lesson to his family, after they 
refused to vacate a property in Kol Dongri that Salem's gang had its eye on. 
Pradeep's brother, Sunil, told mid-day, "Riyaz was the first to approach us for 
the property. He called and said that Salem would kill our whole family if we 
didn't do as they wanted. Riyaz also came to our office and asked us to hand 
over the property to Salem quietly."

Also read: Gangster Abu Salem moves SC against conviction in Jain murder case

"Riyaz should be imprisoned for a long time. People like Salem and Riyaz, who 
take the lives of others, should not be spared. I am happy with our judiciary; 
it took time, but I got justice," he added.

In his testimony to the court, Sunil had said that he too had sustained a 
bullet wound during the attack on his brother on March 7, 1995.

The charges

The special court, presided over by G A Sanap, convicted Siddiqui under the 
same charges as Salem and Hassan, which are sections 120B (criminal 
conspiracy), 302 (murder), 307 (attempt to murder), 193 (false evidence), 386 
(extortion), 449, 450 and 452 (house-trespass) of the Indian Penal Code, along 
with various sections under the TADA that attract the death penalty.

Siddiqui had initially turned approver for the prosecution, giving detailed 
information about the crime. However, he was declared a hostile witness after 
he denied his and Salem's roles in the killing. The court will hear arguments 
on the point of sentencing on September 8.

(source: mid-day.com)








MALDIVES:

Urgent Action



MALDIVES TO RESUME EXECUTIONS BY SEPTEMBER

According to statements by the Maldives President, the death penalty would be 
implemented 'by the end of September'. If carried out, these would be the first 
executions in the country in over 60 years. The Maldives Supreme Court upheld 
the convictions and death sentences of 3 men in mid-2016, who could be at 
imminent risk of execution.

Write a letter, send an email, call, fax or tweet:

* Halt any plans to resume executions and establish an official moratorium on 
all executions, with a view to abolishing the death penalty;

* Immediately commute the death sentence against all prisoners under sentence 
of death, including those imposed for crimes committed when the prisoners were 
below 18 years of age;

* Amend national legislation to remove provisions that are not in line with 
international law and standards and abolish the death penalty for all crimes.

Friendly reminder: If you send an email, please create your own instead of 
forwarding this one!

Contact these 2 officials by 11 October, 2017:

President of Maldives

Abdulla Yameen Gayoom

The President's Office

Boduthakurufaanu Magu, Male' 20113,

Republic of Maldives

Fax: (960) 332 5500

Twitter: @presidency

Salutation: His Excellency

H.E. Ambassador Ahmed Sareer

Permanent Mission of the Republic of Maldives to the United Nations

800 Second Avenue, Suite 400E

New York, NY 10017

Fax: 1 212 661 6405

Phone: 1 212 599 6194

Email: info at MaldivesMission.com

Salutation: Dear Ambassador

(source: Amnesty International)