When I read the news that the four men who were found guilty of the horrific rape crime in Delhi in 2012 were hanged to death in a Delhi prison, I wondered whether these legal killings make any sense when human being are being killed in thousands all over the world by the Corona virus. Shortly after these hangings, came[Read More...]
On March 20 at dawn, four men were hanged simultaneously in the Indian capital. They had little in common with the man who was executed by the State of Florida on January 24, 1989, other than the nation and the world being united in hating them.
Capital punishment is a subject for which both proponents and opponents argue mostly with their stomachs rather than with their heads. On the pro side there is the eye for an eye, life for a life brigade, while on the other side there are those who argue it is inhumane, the state has no right to commit murder (except abortion), and what if we execute the wrong person? There are though cases in which an accused is convicted of truly abominable crimes on absolutely overwhelming evidence for which execution is surely warranted.
There is always a debate on whether capital punishment, to be specific death penalty, should be abolished or retained for ordinary crimes. In my opinion, it should be abolished. In this view of mine, I don’t stand alone. As of 2018, 142 countries have abolished death penalty either in law or practice. Whereas, 56 have retained the power, in which[Read More...]
It is predicted by many that the societies with greater differentiation and specialization are less prone to executions. Contrary to this assumption, it has been shown that societies with greater social differentiation and structural hierarchy are more likely to embrace death penalty. Social systems with more hierarchical order would have greater brutal punitive culture and repressive legal mechanism. The celebrated[Read More...]
On June 29, 2015 the United States Supreme Court argued in Glossip v. Grossthat executions may continue with the use of lethal drug cocktails including the use of midazolam, an extremely painful drug, which in effect, burns to death the condemned by scorching internal organs. The use of midazolam, according to the Court, does not constitute “cruel and unusual punishment” under[Read More...]
An Egyptian Kangaroo Court Saturday (July 28) sentenced 75 supporters of the former President Mohammad Morsi to death. Egyptian Kangaroo courts are on death sentences spree since the overthrow of Mohammad Morsi, the first democratically election president of Egypt by US client General Abdel Fattah el-Sissi who has since assumed the title of Field Marshall. Last month Egypt’s Zagazig Criminal[Read More...]
Echoes of Caryl Chessman have been present at every death penalty and execution in the United States since he was delivered to the gas chamber at San Quentin Prison on May 2, 1960. If his defiant loner’s death was not the very embodiment of arbitrary, cruel, and unusual punishment, then that claim can scarcely be made for any American subsequently[Read More...]
Oklahoma will execute prisoners using an experimental method never before attempted anywhere in the world: nitrogen hypoxia.
Mike Hunter, the state’s attorney general, and Joe M. Allbaugh, the director of the department of corrections, announced Oklahoma will asphyxiate prisoners by locking them in a chamber that will fill with a physiologically inert gas, such as nitrogen. Such gases are not toxic but instead deplete blood oxygen levels.
An Egyptian Court sentenced eight people to death Tuesday and 50 others to life in prison for their role in a case known as the storming of Helwan Police Station. According to prosecution, on 14 August 2013 protesters stormed Helwan Police Station, which led to the killing of three police officers and two civilians. The police station and 20[Read More...]
