[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

Aug. 26





ST KITTS and NEVIS:

Operation Rescue's Caines All For Hanging


Operation Rescue's Richard Caines is supporting the government's position on 
hanging convicted murderers.

Prime Minister Timothy Harris has indicated that his administration favours 
implementing the death penalty.

Caines, speaking on his organization???s radio programme, expressed support for 
that position.

"I'm talking about St Kitts and Nevis and to a lesser extent the rest of the 
Caribbean, we have a problem in our community and some of us are saying it is 
right and some are saying it is not right and so on. I would want to think that 
so long as a court, and I want that on the record, so long as the court says 
you are convicted of a murder, you are guilty and you're sentenced to hang, 
hang them."

Prime Minister Harris's pro-hanging stance comes against the backdrop of more 
than 20 homicides recorded for the year so far.

Operation Rescue's Dwyer Astaphan says the issue is a complicated one.

"Incredible ways, incredibly cruel ways of killing people. You have the gas 
chamber, sometimes the thing does not go off well and the person is gagging for 
2, 3, 5, 12 minutes, you have electrocution sometimes it doesn't go well, you 
have the firing sometimes they don't hit them right, you have the lethal 
injection and then does it reach a point where you say well he killed somebody 
so let him die brutally as well, is the state going to be killing people 
brutally. I am not being soft, I'm just trying to get us to open our minds and 
see every different facet of this thing and how wide we want to carry it if we 
want to carry it there and do we want to look at what is causing people to 
behave the way they behave or are we just going to say well they are going to 
behave how they want, we will deal with them. I think it really needs a very 
broad and comprehensive and deep and honest analysis."

Defense lawyer Chesley Hamilton says he would like to see hanging abolished in 
St Kitts and Nevis.

"I am not in favor of hanging. It is just a barbaric drawback from the days of 
slavery, the Klu Klux Klan and those sort of things, we don't need it in our 
system. There are other ways in which to deal with the whole issue of crime, 
the whole pestilence of crime and if we put our minds together we can come up 
with creative ways of dealing with the issue of crime. We have 40, 50 thousand 
people it's nothing more than a stadium, we can put up a crime plan to deal 
with the situation."

Mr. Hamilton was asked if he thinks the Prime Minister is making a strong case 
to tell criminals to behave or else and if he can see hangings taking place in 
the near future.

"Well the Prime Minister knows, you don't dare criminals you will lose. I once 
heard Michael Manley when there was apartheid say freedom fighters never lose 
and therefore South Africa will be free one day and it is the same thing you 
don't dare criminals the only people who lose when you dare criminals is the 
society, they have nothing to lose. As for hangings it is possible, once there 
is a government that is ready to satisfy the thirst for blood then it can 
happen but it is not going to solve anything, it is not going to deter crime."

Human Rights groups including Amnesty International have been lobbying for 
years to get Caribbean countries to move away from hanging, which these rights 
groups describe as cruel and inhumane punishment.

In St Kitts and Nevis there are strong advocates on both sides - some who 
favour hanging, and some who want it abolished.

(source: winnfm.com)






PHILIPPINES:

Aus man faces Phillipine court for drugs


An Australian man who has faced court in the Philippines over accusations he 
and a Canadian man were peddling party drugs says he is "staying positive".

Damian John Berg, who could face the death penalty if convicted, was handcuffed 
when he was brought into the Regional Court in Makati City on Thursday for the 
1st day of his trial.

Police Officer Freddie Cabaccan, from the anti-illegal drugs group said the 
operation targeting the 34-year-old, began when an informant approached them 
and alleged Canadian man Jeremy Eaton and Berg were selling party drugs in 
Makati City and surrounding areas.

The operation initially targeted just Eaton, Officer Cabaccan told the court, 
but upon the Canadian's arrest on June 20 he told officers he had an associate.

Eaton allegedly told police his associate was Berg and that he was operating 
out of a nearby hotel Red Planet in Poblacion district in Makati City.

Staging a purchase, police allege Berg brought 50 ecstasy tablets with him to 
sell.

Within 30 minutes he was arrested near the hotel, the court heard.

Berg cried in court as CCTV footage of the arrest was shown in court.

The footage, which Berg's defence team argues contradicts the evidence of Supt 
Officer Cabaccan, was only allowed to be shown in part to the court.

As he was being led out of the trial Berg told AAP he was "staying positive".

His matter is expected to return to court next week.

Berg's arrest in June came just before the Phillipine government enacted a 
sweeping and bloody crackdown on drugs in the country under the new president 
Rodrigo Duterte.

Philippine National Police Director General Ronald dela Rosa told a senate 
inquiry into the killings under 'Operation Double Barrel' this week that 756 
drug "users and pushers" had died in police operations from July 1 until August 
22.

Meanwhile more than 1100 other deaths had been reported during the crackdown, 
bringing the total number to more than 1900.

Not all he said, were drug related.

"Contrary to public perception", he said the focus was on the visits to 
people's homes that police were conducting in which they urge "pushers and 
users" to stop.

The success of the operation was shown by the fact that more than 670,000 
people had "surrendered" to police and approximately 12,000 had been arrested.

(source: Yahoo News)






JAPAN:

Abe seeking to criminalize 'conspiracy' in revised bill


The Abe administration has assembled a revised bill to punish conspiracy of 
"organized crime groups" after earlier versions that covered "organizations" in 
general were scrapped 3 times in the Diet.

Administration officials said the revision to the organized crime punishment 
law is intended to prevent crimes such as terrorist attacks before or during 
the 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics and Paralympics.

It is considering submitting the revised bill in the extraordinary Diet session 
that begins in September.

Similar bills with a broader scope were submitted to the Diet in 2003, 2004 and 
2005 by the administration of Junichiro Koizumi. However, all 3 failed to pass 
due to strong criticism over possible broad interpretations of what constitutes 
a conspiracy.

In those versions, those subject to prosecution were only described as "dantai" 
(organizations). In the latest revision, those subject to punishment are 
limited to "soshikiteki hanzai shudan" (organized crime groups).

The organized crime groups are defined as those that intend to commit crimes 
subject to imprisonment of 4 years or longer. They include terrorist 
organizations, gangster outfits, human trafficking organizations and telephone 
fraud groups.

In addition, it increased the conditions that constitute a conspiracy.

In the past 3 proposed revisions, members of organizations could be punished if 
they simply discussed their planned crimes before actually committing them.

Opposition parties and the public criticized the bills, saying that even 
citizens' groups and labor unions could be punished under broad interpretations 
of the revised law. As a result, the bills were scrapped.

For example, there was criticism that employees of a company could be subject 
to prosecution if they discussed in a bar, "Let's kill our boss."

The latest revision was intended to deflect such criticism by having more 
narrowly defined conditions.

The latest revision stipulates that individuals must make a physical 
preparatory act to commit a crime, such as obtaining funds or acquiring goods.

Abe administration officials said that acts such as gathering pamphlets to 
procure weapons would fall under acquiring goods to commit a crime.

However, investigators could still broadly interpret the new revisions as 
definitions of "organized crime groups" and "preparatory acts" remain vague.

In addition, the number of crimes subject to imprisonment of 4 years or longer 
exceed 600, including violations of the Road Traffic Law and the Public Offices 
Election Law. Because such a large number of crimes are covered by the latest 
revision, controversy could erupt over reducing the number of crimes subject to 
the revision.

Under the latest revision, individuals who conspire to commit a crime that 
could bring the death penalty, life imprisonment or more than 10 years in 
prison if carried out could be sentenced up to 5 years behind bars.

Conspiring to commit crimes subject to four to 10 years in prison could be 
punishable by a prison term of up to 2 years.

(source: The Asahi Shimbun)