[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide
July 18 SRI LANKA: EU reiterates call for moratorium on death penalty The European Union has once again called on Sri Lanka to stop the implementation of capital punishment. Ambassadors of EU countries in Sri Lanka had reiterated their request when they met with a group of UNP parliamentarians this morning. According to a joint statement issued by the EU heads of Missions in Sri Lanka, they had restated the strong and unequivocal opposition of the EU and its member states to capital punishment in all circumstances and in all cases. The Heads of Missions also reiterated their call to Sri Lanka to maintain its moratorium on the death penalty with a view towards complete abolition. (source: newsfirst.lk) INDIA: Kathua rape case: HC issues notices to J, 6 convicts; girl's father seeks enhanced punishmentIn the petition filed on July 10, the girl's father had sought enhancement of the convicts' sentence to capital punishment and life imprisonment, and also challenged the acquittal of one accused. The Punjab and Haryana High Court Thursday issued notices to the Jammu and Kashmir government and 6 men convicted in the case of rape and murder of an 8-year-old nomadic girl in Kathua on a plea by her father seeking enhanced punishment for them. The court also issued a notice to the accused who was acquitted in the case by a lower court. In the petition filed on July 10, the girl's father had sought enhancement of the convicts' sentence to capital punishment and life imprisonment, and also challenged the acquittal of one accused. "The court Thursday issued notices to the state of Jammu and Kashmir and all the accused in the matter," petitioner's counsel Utsav Bains said. The division bench of Justices Rajiv Sharma and Harinder Singh Sidhu fixed August 7 as next date of hearing, the counsel said. The father had prayed that the sentence of Sanji Ram, the mastermind of the crime, Deepak Khajuria, a special police officer, and Parvesh Kumar should be enhanced from life imprisonment to capital punishment. The petitioner had also prayed that the sentence of special police officer Surendra Verma, head constable Tilak Raj and sub-inspector Anand Dutta be enhanced from 5 years to life imprisonment. The acquittal of Vishal Jangotra has also been challenged by the petitioner. Last month, a court in Pathankot had awarded life imprisonment till the last breath to Sanji Ram, Deepak Khajuria and Parvesh Kumar. They were convicted under sections of the Ranbir Penal Code (RPC) relating to criminal conspiracy, murder, kidnapping, gangrape, destruction of evidence, drugging the victim and common intention. The court, while acquitting Vishal Jangotra, son of Sanji Ram, had sentenced 3 other accused--Anand Dutta, Tilak Raj and Surender Verma - to 5-year jail. As per charge sheet filed in April last year, the girl was kidnapped on January 10 and was raped in captivity in a small village temple, whose caretaker was Sanjhi Ram, after keeping her sedated for 4 days. She was later bludgeoned to death, it said. (source: indiatoday.in) *** Bill on death penalty for child sex abuse introduced in Rajya Sabha In a bid to combat rising cases of child sex abuse, a Bill for enhancing punishment, including a provision for death penalty, for committing sexual crimes against children was introduced in Rajya Sabha on Thursday. The bill also puts curbs on child pornography by making provisions for imprisonment up to seven years as well as fine. Women and Child Development Minister Smriti Irani introduced the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (Amendment) Bill 2019, that seeks to amend the existing POCSO law of 2012. "...as there is a strong need to take stringent measures to deter the rising trend of child sex abuse in the country, the proposed amendments make provisions for enhancement of punishments for various offences so as to deter the perpetrators and ensure safety, security and dignified childhood for a child," the amendment bill said. It empowers Centre to make rules "for the manner of deleting or destroying or reporting about pornographic material in any form involving a child to the designated authority". According to the amendment bill, those committing penetrative sexual assaults on a child below 16 years of age would be punished with imprisonment up to 20 years, which might extend to life imprisonment as well as fine. "Whoever commits aggravated penetrative sexual assault shall be punished with rigorous imprisonment for a term which shall be not less than 20 years, but which may extend to imprisonment for life, which shall mean imprisonment for the remainder of natural life of that person and shall also be liable to fine or with death," the bill said. To curb child pornography, the Bill provides that those who uses a child for pornographic purposes should be punished with imprisonment for
[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----NH, PENN., ALA., TENN., NEV., CALIF., USA
July 18 NEW HAMPSHIRE: Mercy sisters honored for efforts to help New Hampshire end death penalty A group of Mercy sisters has been honored by the New Hampshire Coalition Against the Death Penalty for the key role they played in making New Hampshire the 21st state in the country to abolish the death penalty. Sisters Eileen Brady, Mary Ellen Foley and Madonna Moran received the recognition on behalf of their community at a celebration in Concord June 22. The New Hampshire Sisters of Mercy have long played an active role in opposing the death penalty. In December 1997, they adopted a “Corporate Stand Against the Death Penalty” and since then many sisters have served on committees, petitioned legislators, written letters to newspaper editors, testified at legislative hearings, participated in rallies and prayer vigils and prayed that the death penalty would be replaced by restorative justice. Their efforts bore fruit May 30 when the New Hampshire Legislature overrode the governor’s veto of a bill to repeal capital punishment. Krisanne Vaillancourt Murphy, executive director of Catholic Mobilizing Network, a Washington-based organization that works to end the use of the death penalty, called the repeal “a major step toward building a culture that unconditionally protects the dignity of life and is yet more evidence that the death penalty is falling out of favor with the American public.” The organization thanked the state’s Catholics for their efforts to support the measure that abolished the death penalty, which included Bishop Peter A. Libasci of Manchester’s written testimony calling capital punishment “a faulty response” to crime. The bishop had urged legislators to “repeal the death penalty” and devote more resources to providing services to families of murder victims as a way to “offer a true path of support and healing.” (source: cruxnow.com) PENNSYLVANIA: Philadelphia DA wants state Supreme Court to declare the death penalty unconstitutional Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner has asked the Pennsylvania Supreme Court to declare the death penalty system unconstitutional, a move in line with a national dwindling of support for the death penalty. “Because of the arbitrary manner in which it has been applied, the death penalty violates our state Constitution’s prohibition against cruel punishments,” Krasner states in a brief filed in the case Jermont Cox v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Krasner’s challenge is part of a series of amicus briefs filed in support of life sentences for Cox and another death row inmate, Kevin Marinelli. Both Cox and Marinelli were sentenced to death for homicide; both are represented by the same lawyers. The briefs come from organizations including the ACLU of Pennsylvania and the Juvenile Law Center, and from the murder victims’ family members. The four family members’ brief filed in Cox’s case “know the pain, confusion, heartache, and trauma left in the wake of a loved one’s murder,” the brief states. But they oppose the death penalty, knowing “firsthand that its imposition only complicates grieving and impedes healing.” The court’s justices—5 Democrats and 2 Republicans—said in December they will consider whether to take up the issue. Out of the 45 people currently on death row in Philadelphia, 37 are black and 4 are from other “minority groups,” according to an analysis of death convictions in Krasner’s brief. “It really is about poverty,” Krasner told The Appeal. “It really is about race.” At the state level, about half of death row prisoners were black over the past 30 years, even though the state’s black population is less than 12%. The lawyers representing Cox and Marinelli asked the state Supreme Court to weigh in on the use of the death penalty last August, when they called it “a system of capital punishment that is replete with error, a national outlier in its design, and a mirror for the inequities and prejudices that plague American society.” In 2013, Philadelphia County ranked 3rd in the country in people it had prosecuted being on death row. When Krasner ran in 2017, he promised not to seek the death penalty. Death sentences have plummeted nationwide, with executions highly geographically concentrated. The year 2018 marked the 4th year in a row with fewer than 30 executions—and 1/2 were in Texas. Ronald J. Tabak, chair of the Death Penalty Committee of the American Bar Association’s Section of Civil Rights and Social Justice, attributes the decline partially to reformist district attorneys in formerly high-use areas, including Krasner in Philadelphia. Krasner and a handful of other reformist district attorneys who’ve opposed the death penalty stand out, The Justice Collaborative legal director Jessica Brand said. “They’re used to the tough on crime mantra in people’s DNA,” she said. Still, opposition to capital punishment has recently gained momentum
