[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide
March 8 IRAN: Imprisoned Spiritual Leader Facing the Death Penalty Again for His Personal Beliefs Imprisoned spiritual thinker Mohammad Ali Taheri has again been tried for the charge of "corruption on earth" despite being cleared of the same charge in 2015, his sister Azardokht Taheri told the Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI). If convicted, the founder of the banned Erfan-e Halgheh spiritual group could be issued the death penalty. "We are very worried. The authorities have no respect for their own rulings. My brother was acquitted of 'corruption on earth,' but according to his lawyer (Mahmoud Alizadeh Tabatabaee), that charge was brought up again in court on February 27 (2017) even though the trial was supposed to be for the charge of 'engaging in medical practices,'" Azardokht Taheri told CHRI on March 2, 2017. The day after his trial, the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) station aired a propaganda video featuring alleged former students of Taheri calling for his execution for his alleged promotion of "anti-Islamic" views. "This program was shown to deceive the public," said Azardokht Taheri. "Mr. Taheri has many students and they have always said that they got good results from his courses. Why weren't they interviewed?" "Nowhere (in the video) does Mr. Taheri say he has done anything wrong," she added. "They aired only bits and pieces of his statements. We're worried that it was aired for sinister reasons." In the heavily edited interviews, Taheri's "students" claim he taught anti-Islamic ideas and encouraged them to distance themselves from God and Islam. One woman said her daughter stopped praying after attending his classes. The video also included clips from Taheri's lectures, all of which included no statements against Islam. Some scenes also appeared to be taken from his taped interrogation sessions, in which he refuses to express regret for his personal beliefs. Mohammad Ali Taheri, 60, was due to be freed in May 2016 after the completion of his 5-year prison sentence for "insulting the sacred" and "immoral contact with women." In February 2015, he was again interrogated about alleged heresy in his books and sentenced to death for spreading "corruption on earth," but the Supreme Court rejected the verdict in December and opened his case for reconsideration. His latest trial was held at Branch 28 of the Revolutionary Court presided by Judge Mashallah Ahmadzadeh. Iran's security establishment has come down hard on Taheri and supporters of the Erfan-e Halgheh spiritual group, viewing it and any other alternative belief system, especially those seeking converts, as a threat to the prevailing Shia order. (source: iranhumanrights.org) U.N. Special Rapporteur Concerned About the Continued Practice of Public Execution in Iran Ms. Asma Jahangir was appointed as Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran by The Human Rights Council of the U.N., during its 33rd Session. After completion of her study, she said she regrets that her study does not reveal any notable improvement in the situation of human rights in the country. She says that the situation in areas like independence of judiciary and lawyers, freedom of expression, and use of arbitrary detentions continue to be of serious concern. Human rights organizations tracking executions in Iran estimate that at least 530 executions took place in 2016. The majority of these executions were for not the "most serious" drug-related offences. Drug offenders are often deprived of basic due process and fair trials. They are held in long periods of incommunicado and pretrial detention, lack adequate access to a lawyer and/or to a proper defence, there are allegations that drug offenders are subjected to beatings and coerced confessions which are later used in revolutionary courts to secure their death sentences. The recently amended Criminal Procedure Code which mandates that all death sentences, including those for drug offences be reviewed by the Supreme Court does not seem to have led to any significant change in this respect. The Special Rapporteur was also concerned about the continued practice of public execution. It is reported that some executions took place in public places in the presence of children, this has however been denied by the State Party. The Islamic Republic of Iran has reportedly executed the highest number of juvenile offenders in the world during the past decade. Despite an absolute ban on the practice under international law, the Iranian penal code continues to explicitly retain the death penalty for boys of at least 15 years of age and girls of at least 9 years for qisas (retribution in kind) or hudud crimes, like homicide, adultery or sodomy. As a result of the 2013 amendments to the penal code, judges are now required to assess the mental
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, N.H., GA., FLA., ARK., NEB., USA
March 8 TEXASexecution Texas killer Ruiz apologizes for '92 contract murder before execution"Words cannot begin to express how sorry I am," the condemned prisoner said in his final statement. After the U.S. Supreme Court rejected his last appeal, condemned contract killer Rolando Ruiz, Jr., was executed Tuesday night by the state of Texas -- its 3rd lethal injection in the past 2 months. Prison officials at the Texas State Penitentiary in Huntsville administered the lethal drugs at around 10:30 p.m., not long after the Supreme Court's decision. He was pronounced dead 29 minutes later. Ruiz previously received 2 stays of execution from federal and state appeals courts. Monday, a judge in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit denied another request for a stay and the United States' highest court followed suit late Tuesday. Ruiz, 44, was tried and convicted of the 1992 contract killing of Theresa Rodriguez, which was orchestrated by her husband, Michael, and his brother, Mark, in order to collect on her $400,000 life insurance policy. Ruiz showed remorse for the 29-year-old woman's death in his final statement Tuesday night. "I would like to say to the Sanchez family how sorry I am. Words cannot begin to express how sorry I am and the hurt that I have caused you and your family," he told the woman's relatives just moments before his execution began. "To my family, thank you for all your love and support. I am at peace. Jesus Christ is Lord. I love you all." 2 of Theresa Rodriguez's sisters and 2 brothers in-law witnessed the execution, as did an acquaintance and half-brother of Ruiz's. "There's never closure," the victim's father, Eddie Sanchez, said Monday. "It's not going to bring my daughter back." Detectives found during their criminal investigation that Ruiz was paid $2,000 to kill Rodriguez when she returned home from an outing with her husband and brother in-law, who were in on the plot, on July 14, 1992. She was shot once in the face by Ruiz, who ambushed her while she sat in a car in the driveway of her San Antonio home. The Rodriguez brothers pleaded guilty in the case and received life in prison. Ruiz, who was 20 at the time of the crime, was given a death sentence after a jury found him guilty of capital murder in May 1995. Michael Rodriguez was later a member of the Texas Seven, a group of prisoners who escaped from a prison in east central Texas in 2000. He was executed 8 years later for killing a police officer during the escape. The issue weighed by the Supreme Court Tuesday night was whether Ruiz had been subjected to cruel and unusual punishment by spending 17 years in solitary confinement. Ruiz's attorneys argued in their petition that he had been, which would constitute a violation of the Eighth Amendment. The high court disagreed. Ruiz's execution follows the lethal injections of 2 other convicted killers in Texas this year -- Christopher Chubasco Wilkins and Terry Darnell Edwards on Jan. 11 and Jan. 26, respectively. It is the 5th death sentence carried out in the United States this year. Historically, Texas is the most active state when it comes to executing inmates. Nearly 550 Texas prisoners have been put to death since a nationwide moratorium on capital punishment was lifted in 1976. By contrast, California, which holds a death row population nearly 3 times the size of Texas, has executed 13 people. Florida, which incarcerates the nation's 2nd-largest group of condemned inmates (396), has executed less than 100 in that same time span. In 2016, though, Georgia carried out the most executions (9) in the country, followed by Texas (7). Earlier this year, Texas filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for preventing the state from importing drugs that are used in lethal injections. Several other states are also having difficulty obtaining the drugs traditionally used in a 3-step process. Last week, Arkansas scheduled the executions of 8 prisoners on 4 days in April, purportedly because its supply of 1 drug will expire in May. (source: UPI) *** Executions under Greg Abbott, Jan. 21, 2015-present23 Executions in Texas: Dec. 7, 1982present-541 Abbott#scheduled execution date-nameTx. # 24-March 14James Bigby--542 25-April 12-Paul Storey---543 26-May 16---Tilon Carter--544 27-May 24---Juan Castillo--545 28-June 28---Steven Long---546 29-July 19-Kosoul Chanthakoummane---547 (sources: TDCJ & Rick Halperin) ** DA will seek death penalty in fatal beating of pregnant Corpus Christi woman Prosecutors will seek the death penalty for a man accused of fatally beating to death his pregnant girlfriend, Nueces
