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DEATH PENALTY REPORT: NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2020 UK Date format: day/month/yearThe death penalty is the ultimate cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment. Amnesty opposes the death penalty in all cases without exception - regardless of who is accused, the nature or circumstances of the?crime, guilt or innocence or method of execution.International Report (from 12.11.20 – 10.12.20)USAFederal Executions –12.11.20 – The outgoing President is set to leave office having instigated more federal executions than any other, and likely to be the only President in history to carry out such executions during the ‘lame duck period’ prior to the incoming administration. Seven such executions have taken place to date, with those of Lisa Montgomery and Brandon Bernard scheduled for December, and that of Orlando Hall expected to be announced. (Source: The Independent.)13.11.20 – It was made clear that the US Department of Justice will not be making a decision about whether to seek the death penalty for the two men – Steven Carrillo and Patrick Underwood – before the new Attorney General is in place. In the light of the campaign promises made by the incoming administration, the possibility of the Federal Prosecutors seeking death penalty sentences seems unlikely. (Source: The Mercury News.)Lisa Montgomery – 16.11.20 - Lawyers acting for Lisa Montgomery (picture: Attorneys for Lisa Montgomery/Reuters) have 182880018161000contracted Covid-19, following a visit to the Federal Prison, putting her hopes for clemency in jeopardy. Ms Montgomery, who was found guilty of murder and kidnapping, is scheduled to be executed on 8th December. She would be the first woman to undergo a federal execution in almost 70 years, and the ninth prisoner since the reinstatement of federal executions in April of this year. (Source: The Guardian.)20.11.20 – The execution of Ms Montgomery has been enjoined by a Judge until 31st December. (Source: Time.)24.11.20 – The Justice Department have re-scheduled Ms Montgomery’s execution for 12th January, eight days before President-Elect Biden is due to take office. Note: Mr Biden is believed to oppose the death penalty, but it is not known whether executions would be paused immediately he takes office. (Source: Associated Press.)19.11.20 – The federal execution took place of Orlando Hall. The Supreme Court had denied last-minute legal challenges from Mr Hall’s attorneys, who had argued that racial bias had played a role in his sentencing. They had also expressed concerns regarding the execution protocol and other constitutional issues. Mr Hall had been convicted of kidnap, rape and murder. His was the eighth federal prisoner to be executed this year. (Source: NBC News.)20.11 20 – The Trump Administration has ordered Federal Prosecutors to seek the death penalty for Jairo Saenz, a gang land leader charged in connection with a series of murders. (Source: Mail Online.)20.11.20 – The Justice Department scheduled three further federal executions to take place in December and January of next year - Alfred Bourgeois on 11th December, Cory Johnson on 14th January, and Dustin Higgs on 15th January. (Source: The Times of Israel.)21.11.20 – A spokesperson for President-Elect Joe Biden stated that he was against the death penalty and would work to end its use. (Source: The Times of Israel.)25.11.20 – The Justice Department is about to publish new regulations in the Federal Register which would allow for the use of additional methods for federal executions. These methods would include firing squads and electrocution. The Department has not indicated that it plans to carry out executions using these methods, and lethal injection has been the only means employed for some decades; however there have been increasing challenges to lethal injection by prisoners on federal death row. (Source: The New York Times,)30.11.20 – Kim Kardashian has highlighted the case of Brandon Bernard in a Twitter posting, saying he did not receive a fair trial. (Source: Mail Online.)2.12.20 – Federal Prosecutors stated they would not be seeking the death penalty for Robert Dear, who has been charged with a shooting in which three people died and nine were injured. Mr Dear has insisted that he is competent to stand trial but on repeated occasions he has been deemed incompetent. (Source: The Colorado Sun.)6.12.20 – A week-long virtual Human Rights Conference has begun in Terre Haute and will last throughout the week, when the executions of two more prisoners on Federal death row – Brandon Bernard and Alfred Bourgeois – are scheduled to take place. The Conference is being run by activists against the death penalty who wish to raise awareness about ‘wrongful convictions and the impact on the families of death row inmates’. (Source: .)Texas – 13.11.20 – State Senator Eddie Lucio Jr. filed Senate Bill 188. Should the Bill be passed, the death penalty in Texas would be abolished. The Senator has said, ‘ All life must be protected. By eliminating state sanctioned executions, SB 188 falls within the conviction which holds all life to be sacred’. He feels this to be in line with the State’s strong anti-abortion policies. The Texas Catholic Conference of Bishops is supportive of Senator Lucio, believing the death penalty to be incompatible with human dignity. Note: Following the reintroduction of the death penalty by the Supreme Court in 1976, the first execution to be carried out took place in Texas, and the State has since carried out the greatest no of executions. (Source: The Monitor.)Alabama – 17.11.20 – Former Florida Circuit Judge OH Eaton Jr has called for the intervention of the US Supreme Court into the cases of 32 people on death row whose Jury decisions for life sentences were overridden by a Trial Judge. (Source: Bloomberg Law.)Pennsylvania – 19.11.20 – The State’s Supreme Court Justices unanimously upheld the death sentence imposed on Melvyn Knight, who had been convicted of the torture and killing of a mentally disabled woman. They rejected all the claims of his appeal, including that ‘the jurors had acted with passion and prejudice and arbitrarily imposed the death penalty’. (Source: TribLIVE.)Florida – 25.11.20 – The State Supreme Court rejected requests to reinstate death sentences for two prisoners on death row, ruling that earlier orders meant new sentencing hearings must take place. The two men concerned were Bessman Okafor and Michael James Jackson, both convicted of murder, but the ruling could have implications for other prisoners. (Source: .)Algeria – 12.11.20 – Minister of Justice, Belkacem Zaghmati, said discussions were taking place regarding a draft law to ‘combat crimes of child abduction, with consideration being given to the possibility of resuming the death penalty’ – ‘ We can resume the death penalty [as stipulated by law.] …. Algeria is a sovereign state and it is free to apply the death penalty. There is no local or global objection to that.’ (Source: Middle East Monitor.)Bangladesh – 17.11.20 – The Parliamentary Body on Women and Children Affairs tabled its final report on the Women and Children Repression Prevention (amendment) Bill at the House, retaining the provision of the death penalty for crimes of rape, proposing amendments to the previous law so as to incorporate it as the maximum sentence that could be imposed. (Source: The Daily Star.)23.11.20 – The death sentence imposed on Russell Mia, convicted of murder in 2015, was commuted to life imprisonment by the High Court. (Source: Dhaka Tribune.)UN Vote Against the Death Penalty – 17.11 20 – 120 UN member states voted in favour of a resolution in the Third Committee of the UN General Assembly, reiterating a call for a moratorium on the use of capital punishment. Only 39 voted against, including 11 from the Asia -Pacific Region – Afghanistan, Brunei Darussalam, China, India, Japan, The Maldives, North Korea, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Singapore and Tonga. The resolution went further than previous versions – for the first time women were acknowledged as subject to the discriminatory application of the death penalty. The General Assembly Plenary is expected to adopt the resolution. (Source: Human Rights Watch.)World Coalition Against the Death Penalty Newsletter – 19.11.20 – Follow the link for the November issue of the Coalition’s Newsletter. Items includeThe resolution draft of the UN General Assembly calling on States to observe a moratorium on executions adopted by 120 UN member States.The 18th World Day Against the Death Penalty and the life-saving importance of effective legal representationThe 36th Session of the Universal Periodic Review held on2-13 NovemberA UN event focusing on the gender dimension of the death penaltyThe signing by Kazakhstan of the Second Protocol to the ICCPRThe Webinar held on 5th November held by Together Against the Death PenaltyDocuments regarding the Death Penalty available in the Library of the World Coalition. (Note: including ‘Enduring Injustice. The Persistence of Racial Discrimination in the US Death Penalty’ – Ngozi Ndulu, DPIC.(Source: World Coalition Against the Death Penalty.)Australia/Japan – 19.11.20 – The Reciprocal Access Agreement (RAA) – which provides a legal framework enabling the Australian Defence Force and the Japanese Self-Defence Force to operate in each other’s territories – was reached in principle this week. A significant stumbling block has been Japan’s death penalty and the Australian Government’s opposition to it. Unlike other countries who have abolished capital punishment, Australia’s outward-looking policy of pursuing its abolition in other countries does not restrict this to instances where Australian nationals receive death sentences, but takes a principled stance against its imposition ‘in all circumstances for all people’. It had been reported that a breakthrough had been made when the Japanese Authorities were said to be considering replacing the death penalty with the maximum sentence applicable under Australian law. It is now understood that the cases of ADF members convicted of serious crimes in Japan would be considered on a ‘case by case’ basis. It is not, however, clear how this would operate, and to date there is no public guarantee that Australian solders would not be subject to the death penalty. (Source: The Conversation.)Saudi Arabia – 23.11.20 – Reprieve are continuing to speak out on behalf of the 10 – possibly more - prisoners who remain on death row, despite the Royal Decree announcing the end of capital punishment for juvenile offenders. The President of the country’s Human Rights Commission, Awwad Al-Awwad, had said their sentences would be commuted to a ‘prison sentence of no longer than ten years in a juvenile detention facility’. It appears that a law was passed in 2018 stipulating the maximum sentence of ten years but this did not apply to cases where the death penalty was mandated by Sharia law, and that this exclusion applies also to the Royal Decree. (Source: The Guardian.)Iran – 25.11.20 – Iran has dismissed an appeal from Sweden not to enforce the death sentence imposed on Ahmadreza Djalali, a Swedish- Iranian Doctor, whose execution is feared to be imminent. Arrested in 2016, Dr Djalali was convicted of ‘corruption on earth’. He has said he was tortured into ‘confessing’ to espionage, and was prosecuted solely because he refused to use his academic ties in European institutions to spy for Iran. (Source: BBC News.) Note: Amnesty have called for his execution to be halted immediately. See below to take action.8.12.20 – The Supreme Court has upheld the death sentence imposed by the Revolutionary Court on Ruhollah Zam, the dissident journalist convicted in 2017 of ‘fuelling anti-government unrest’ on social media. (Source: Al-Jazeera.) Egypt – 1.12.20 – The Egyptian authorities have executed at least 57 people in the past two months in a ‘horrifying execution spree’, nearly double the number recorded for the whole of 2019. In October, 15 men convicted of murder in cases related to political violence were executed, with an additional 38 men and 4 women, convicted of murder in ordinary criminal cases, and two men convicted of rape, put to death in October and November. These numbers are likely to be an under-estimate since the authorities do not publish numbers or inform families or lawyers in advance of executions. The authorities have also clamped down on Human Rights organisations involved with the death penalty. (Source: Amnesty International.)Japan – 5.12.20 – Sakae Menda, the first person to have been released from death row following his acquittal in a re-trial, has died in a nursing home at the age of 95. Mr Menda had been found guilty of involvement in robbery and murder in a trial where he had been coerced into a confession, evidence supporting his testimony was ignored and false witness testimony accepted. He was released at 57, having spent 34 years in prison, and campaigned against the death penalty for the remainder of his life. (Source: The Japan Times,)Urgent ActionsFlorida – A request has been received from Reprieve asking supporters to send birthday wishes to Marita, wife of Kris Maharaj who – despite having been found innocent of the crime of which he had been convicted – remains in prison. (Circulated to the Group and posted on the website and Facebook – 25.11.20.)Texas – A request was received from Reprieve to send a message of support to Linda Carty, the British grandmother who has been on death row since 2002. (Circulated to the Group and posted on the website 27.11.20.)Iran – An Iranian -Swedish Doctor is at risk of imminent execution – see Anti DP Project below for link with full details. (Circulated to the Group and posted on the website 28.11.20).Saudi Arabia – An email has been received from Reprieve calling on supporters to send them messages of support for Ali al-Nimr for his 26th birthday on 20th December. Despite the Royal Decree, Ali remains on death row, sentenced to death for ‘crimes’ linked to protesting at the age of 17. (Circulated to the Group and posted on 7.12.20.) Campaigning Amnesty Anti-Death Penalty Project – Follow the link for this month’s update. This includes: The commutation to life sentences of the death sentences imposed on the two men convicted of the murder of the two British backpackersAn Urgent Action on behalf of Dr Ahmadreza Djalali sentenced to death for ‘corruption on earth’ following a grossly unfair trial and ‘confessions’ obtained through tortureThe case of Rodney Reed, convicted of abduction, rape and murder, but around whose case there has been a great deal of controversyReference to the UN call for a moratorium on executions (see also WCADP Newsletter above.) Information on the UK ‘Bloody Code’.A Video on the abolition of the death penalty with statistics from 2018An obituary for Professor Roger Hood, an authority on and fighter against the death penalty for many years.10.12.20 ................
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