The US Executions

(i)  Michael Gonzales: 

Convicted of fatally stabbing his elderly neighbors in 1994 after they awakened while he was burglarizing their home. In 2009, Gonzales received a new punishment trial because of testimony from a former psychologist for Texas prisons who cited race and ethnicity as reasons for his future dangerousness. A March 2013 execution date was set, but a federal judge issued a stay at the request of Gonzales's attorney, who sought time to prepare a motion to strike his death sentence on grounds of mental incompetence. A convicted and twice sentenced murderer received a stay of execution that will prolong his case even longer than the almost 20 years it's been in the system. Department of Criminal Justice executioner after 6 p.m. on March 21, 2013, but the actual date is a little murkier now. Federal District Judge Robert Junell granted Gonzales a stay of execution after three attorneys with the Texas Habeas Assistance and Training Project filed a motion to delay his death date until they could formulate proper motions to show his execution is not warranted. Gonzales, who was convicted in the 1994 stabbing deaths of Merced and Manuel Aguirre, was originally sentenced to death in 1995. However, that ruling was overturned and sent back to state court, where he was resentenced in 2009, again with the death penalty. After often being disruptive and displaying lewd gestures and foul language throughout his resentencing, Gonzales waived his right to state habeas appeal, one of the appeal options after his automatic direct state appeal. Fernando Aguirre, one of the sons of Manuel and Merced Aguirre, said that he is no longer holding out hope for a quick resolution and execution in this case. “It's very frustrating because we were told he'd exhausted all of his appeals and they set the date for the execution,” Fernando Aguirre said. “And then they said ,nope, guess what, he can file another appeal.” Fernando Aguirre said he was present at both the original trial and the times. Instead, Fernando Aguirre said he believes the continuing battle is mostly legalese, and harms the family members more than anything. “I've made it a point not to put my life on hold for this. It's not what's going to define me,” he said. “Otherwise, that bastard wins. He's not going to win.” Fernando Aguirre said he believes it will be at least another few years before the case is finalized, as he said the defense attorneys are just trying to prolong the situation. But the attorneys filing court documents on his behalf claim that Gonzales may have been mentally incapable of standing trial, explaining that drugs, alcohol
and abuse from his father played a role in deteriorating his psychological state. The document filed by the attorneys claims defense attorneys and the trial court did not explore Gonzales' competence well enough and that his original attorneys “saw Mr. Gonzales as bad, rather than mad.” In his order, Junell allowed defense attorneys until May 24 to present an amended federal habeas corpus petition. Fernando Aguirre said Gonzales made it up in his mind he was going to kill the elderly couple, despite a good rapport between the Aguirres and Gonzales'family. “Anytime his mom needed help on something, my parents were right there,” Fernando Aguirre said. “My parents were great folks. They were very good, hardworking people. They always helped people who asked for

Execution (State Sponsored Murder): Thursday, March 21, 2013 at 6:00 pm. (Stayed)

(ii) Kimberly McCarthy:

A former crack addict who was sentenced to death for the 1997 slaying of an elderly woman during a home robbery near Dallas. McCarthy, 51, is the former wife of New Black Panther Party founder Aaron Michaels, with whom she has a son. She is one of 10 women on Texas death row. Since the date was announced Sept. 12, she has been the only one with a scheduled execution. Three of the nearly 500 people Texas has put to death in the modern era have been women. Hours before her scheduled execution Jan. 29, 2013, a Dallas judge put it off until April 3, based on her attorneys' assertions that jury selection in McCarthy's trial was tainted by racism.
Execution: Wednesday, April 3, 2013 at 6:00 pm.

(iii) Rigoberto Avila Jr:

The 40-year-old veteran from El Paso was convicted in the February 2000 slaying of his girlfriend's son while babysitting. On 02/29/2000, El Paso, Avila was babysitting a 19 month old Hispanic male and his sibling at their residence.  Avila struck the victim in the abdomen, causing the death of the child.Avila served in the military during Desert Storm. The U.S. Supreme Court declined in 2010 to hear an appeal filed by his attorney, Robin Norris. Avila, of El Paso, was born Aug. 5, 1972. He arrived on death row in 2001. Before being incarcerated, he worked as a laborer.

Execution: Wednesday, April 10, 2013 at 6:00 pm
(iv) Ronnie Paul Threadgill:

Threadgill, 38, was sentenced to death for a slaying in 2001 outside a Navarro County nightclub. He was convicted of firing two shots into a car, hitting a 17-year-old who was in the back seat. The U.S. Supreme Court declined in 2012 to review the case. Threadgill's appeal asserted that his lawyers should have negotiated for a felony murder charge instead of capital murder and should have rebutted an alleged shooting in Freestone County that was brought up during the trial. Judge John Jackson on Monday set April 16, 2013, as the date Ronnie Paul Threadgill will be executed for murder.
Threadgill, 38, who was sentenced to death in 2002 for the murder of a 17-year-old outside a Navarro County nightclub, sat quietly in the 13th District
Courtroom Monday to hear his execution date in a brief, 10-minute hearing.
Navarro County District Attorney R. Lowell Thompson said Threadgill made no statement to the court during the hearing, answering “No” when asked by Jackson if he had any statement.

Execution: Tuesday, April 16, 2013 at 6:00 pm.
(iv) Elroy Chester III:

A jury sentenced him to death after he pleaded guilty to the 1998 fatal shooting of a Port Arthur firefighter who was was slain after arriving at his sister's home during a robbery. The high court (The Supreme Court) refused to hear an appeal from Elroy Chester. Lawyers for Chester say he is mentally impaired, making him ineligible for execution under the U.S. Supreme Court guidelines for the 1998 shooting death of Willie Ryman III. Ryman was trying to keep Chester from raping his two nieces at their Port Arthur home when he was killed.Prosecutors have argued that Chester was not mentally impaired.Chester, who has been linked to at least five murders and three rapes, pleaded guilty to Ryman's slaying.

Execution: Wednesday, April 24, 2013 at 6:00 pm.
(v) Richard Cobb:

One of two men condemned in a 2002 robbery-slaying in the small, East Texas town of Ruskin. He and Beunka Adams (executed April 26, 2012) were convicted of forcing three convenience-store workers into a car, driving them to a field, raping one of the women, and shooting all three with a shotgun. One worker, a mentally disabled man, died. The women survived by playing dead. Prosecutors said the murder happened after Adams and another man robbed the store in the small east Texas town of Rusk in September 2002. On September 2, 2002, in Cherokee County, Texas, Cobb and co-defendant, Beunka Adams, abducted three victims: a man and two women. They fatally shot the man, Kenneth Wayne Vandever, sexually assaulted and shot the two women and left their bodies in a field.  Cobb was sentenced to death in January 2004.
Execution: Thursday, April 25, 2013 at 6:00 pm.

Summary:
Beunka Adams (Executed April 26, 2012 06:25 p.m. CDT by Lethal Injection in Texas): Along with accomplice Richard Cobb, Adams robbed a convenience store in Rusk, Texas. At the time of the robbery, Candace Driver and Nikki Dement were working in the store, and the only customer present was Kenneth Vandever. Adams and Cobb were wearing masks and after getting cash from the register, forced the two employees and the customer into a Cadillac parked in the lot and drove to a remote location. After forcing Driver and Vandever into the trunk, Adams and Cobb sexually assaulted Dement. They later made all three victims kneel on the ground, shooting all three with a shotgun. Believing all were dead, both fled the scene. Vandever died from his wounds, but Driver and Dement survived and testified against Adams and Cobb. Accomplice Cobb was convicted and sentenced to death in a separate trial eight months before Adams. Evidence tied the two, met as ninth-graders at a boot camp, to a string of robberies that happened around the same time.
Final/Special Meal:Texas no longer offers a special "last meal" to condemned inmates. Instead, the inmate is offered the same meal served to the rest of the unit.
Final/Last Words:"To the victims, I'm very sorry for everything that happened. Everything that happened that night was wrong. If I could take it back, I would ... I messed up and can't take that back." Adams expressed love to his family and asked his victims and their families not to be taken over by hate. "I am not the malicious person that you think I am. I was real stupid back then. I made a great many mistakes."

(vi) Carroll Joe Parr:

Condemned for the shooting death of a man in a drug deal outside a North Waco convenience store in 2003. Parr and his fall partner, Earl Whiteside, were accused of approaching two men sitting in a car, forcing them to the side of the building at gunpoint, and robbing and shooting them. The second victim survived. Whiteside is serving a 15-year prison term after pleading to aggravated robbery. As he was led from the courtroom after the date was set, he yelled, “Death is a prize.”Members of his family were crying and some called out words of encouragement to him.
Parr and Earl Whiteside were accused of approaching the two teenagers outside of the store, pointing guns at them and ordering them to get out of their car. They forced the two victims to the side of the building and demanded money, authorities said. The two teenagers handed over their wallets and then were shot after one of the
victims told Parr they didn't have any more money. Parr was convicted of capital murder on May 21, 2004 and was sentenced to die five days later. Whiteside entered a guilty plea in March 2004.
Execution:Tuesday, May 7, 2013 at 6:00 pm.
(vii) John Quintanilla Jr:

Arrested in a Victoria, Texas, robbery that turned deadly, Quintanilla was convicted - along with Jeffrey Bibb - of slipping into an amusement arcade wearing a mask and brandishing a rifle, demanding cash from a worker and ordering customers to lie down on the floor. The murder victim, a former sheriff's deputy, was shot three times when he stood up and grabbed Quintanilla's weapon. Bibb and Quintanilla were charged with capital murder in the 2002 slaying. Bibb received a lengthy prison sentence.
From his prison cell he writes: 
Dear reader,
Hi, my name is john m. Quintanilla Jr. I am an inmate on the Texas Death Row. I’ve been here for a little over 3 years. I try to fill my time with things like drawing, writing poems, writing letters and listening to my radio.On Texas Death Row I am confined to a cell for 22 hours a day. i was born in Port Lavaca Texas.  But I have lived in places like Texas City, Palacios, Bloomington and Victoria. but mostly in Texas City and Victoria.
I was born on December 9, 1976. I have about 22 tattoos and a few piercings. I am on Death row for a robbery/murder that `i did not commit although i did claim responsibility. but I did have my reasons for that and if your interested in finding out, all you got to do is write and I’ll explain it.
As you can guess there is not much to do in this small cell and sometimes 22 hours a day can seem like a very long time. So I am asking anyone and everyone with a little tome to drop me a few lines. It would really be nice. thank you for your time and consideration.
Sincerely,
John M. Quintanilla Jr.
#999491
Polunsky Unit
3872 F.M. 350 South
Livingston, Texas, 77351
USA
Execution: Tuesday, May 14, 2013 at 6:00 pm.
(viii) Jefferey D. Williams:

Condemned in the 1999 shooting death of a Houston Police Officer who was trying to arrest him for driving a stolen Lexus. The officer was alive when backup arrived but died later of his wounds. A delay in the arrival of an ambulance sparked a probe of the Houston Fire Department's dispatching procedures. The contention was that the officer might have survived had he received treatment sooner. Investigators found that the dispatcher initially misdirected the ambulance to a location miles away. Jeffrey Demond Williams, 23, was arrested moments after the shooting and charged with capital murder. Police have retrieved the 9mm handgun they believe was used to kill Blando.
Execution: Wednesday, May 15, 2013 at 6:00 pm.
(ix) Robert Lynn Pruett:

An argument with a prison guard who had written him up for a minor infraction of the rules led Pruett to stab the guard to death with a shank, according to prosecutors in Corpus Christi who obtained the death penalty against him. The guard was killed in the maximum-security McConnell state prison unit in Bee County, where Pruett was serving a life sentence he began when he was 16. At the time, he was believed to be the youngest person in the state's adult prison system. Most of those in the courtroom were armed security personnel when Texas Department of Criminal Justice correctional officers walked in with Robert Lynn Pruett. Senior District Judge Ronald Yeager sat on the bench, presiding over the 156th District Court. Yeager was only minutes away from telling Pruett he was scheduling his execution by lethal injection for May 21.
Pruett turned 33 in September and has been on death row since he was convicted in a Corpus Christi courtroom on April 30, 2002, of murdering 37-year-old Daniel Nagle. Nagle had been discovered, lying in his own blood, near a multipurpose room in the William G. McConnell maximum security unit in Bee County on Dec. 17, 1999. He had been stabbed repeatedly with an inmate-made “shank,” a steel bar sharpened on one end and wrapped with cloth on the other end..
Execution: Tuesday, May 21, 2013 at 6:00 pm.
(x) Vaughn Ross:

A former architecture student at Texas Tech, he was condemned in the 2001 murders of an 18-year-old woman he was feuding with and a Texas Tech associate dean who happened to be with her. Ross's attorneys argued that police contaminated DNA testing by mishandling it and suggested the slayings stemmed from Birdsall's visits to "a high-crime area" to patronize prostitutes. Family members of the victims said the death sentence brought them little peace. The relatives included Birdsall's son, Nat, who opposes the death penalty and said his father did, too. A murder victim's sister ex pressed empathy for the mother of Vaughn Ross after a jury sentenced him to die for killing two people last year. "My heart goes out to his mother," Liza McVade said. "We lost something, and today she lost something too." The same jury convicted Ross for the Jan. 30, 2001, capital murder of Douglas Birdsall and Viola Ross McVade. He faced only two possible punishments —life in prison or death. Ross showed no reaction when District Judge Cecil Puryear read the sentence. Ross' mother and sister, who attended the entire trial, were not in the courtroom.
Execution: Thursday, July 18, 2013 at 6:00 pm.
(xi) Douglas Feldman:

The former financial analyst from Richardson, Texas, was convicted of shooting to death two truck drivers in separate road-rage incidents in 1998. A federal appeals court in September rejected Feldman's appeal, in which he claimed his trial lawyers were deficient, the jury received incorrect instructions, and a prospective juror was improperly dismissed. In his appeal, Feldman contended that he had deficient legal help at his trial, that the jury received improper instructions and that a prospective juror was improperly dismissed. Feldman, testified at his 1999 trial that he carried a 9mm handgun when riding his motorcycle because he thought his life was in danger. His lawyers presented evidence showing that he had been treated earlier for substance abuse and paranoia. He told jurors he was cruising on his Harley-Davidson on southbound Central Expressway in August 1998 when a truck “came out of nowhere, just flying.” He said he feared for his life and became angry. Feldman testified that he fired at Everett's truck “because I felt like I needed to try to stop that man.” When the truck continued on the highway, “I chased Mr. Everett down, and I shot him to death” near the Plano-Allen line. Moments later, he spotted Velasquez at a gas station at Hillcrest and Arapaho roads, “exploded again in anger” and shot him, even though Velasquez had done nothing to him. “I felt emotionally compelled,” Feldman told jurors. “I was consumed by anger.” A third man was shot at a northwest Dallas restaurant parking lot, but he survived. The jury took 24 minutes to convict Feldman of capital murder. Among evidence were letters Feldman wrote to prosecutors in which he confessed to the shootings and referred to jurors hearing his case as “a bunch of fat, ignorant slobs.”
Execution: Wednesday, July 31, 2013 at 6:00 pm.

Courtesy:
(i) Execution Watch
(ii) Prison Pen Pals
(iii) Prosecuting Attorney, etc.

 Death Row Prisoner Larry Swearingen May Be Innocent. Do Texas Courts Care?

~~Jordan Smith, February 20, 2013 

Just over a year ago, in January 2012, Texas Governor Rick Perry marked a gruesome milestone: with 239 executions under his belt, he had officially overseen half of all executions carried out in that state since the reinstatement of the death penalty. Since then, Texas has killed fourteen inmates, solidifying Perry’s position as the governor who has presided over the most executions in history. To date, 492 prisoners have been put to death since the state’s death chamber roared back to life in 1982. By the time this issue of The Nation hits newsstands, the number will likely be 493.

Amid so much state-sanctioned killing there is scant official acknowledgment that the state’s capital punishment system is fraught with problems. As the body count rises, nagging evidence points to the possibility that Texas has executed at least one innocent person, and may be poised to kill more. The arson-murder case of Cameron Todd Willingham, killed in 2004, is the best known, but there are many other cases that raise serious questions about the guilt of people on Texas’ death row.

As it moves down the roster of executions scheduled for this year, the state is perilously close to adding another name to its list of potential innocents: Larry Swearingen, whose case highlights a growing tension in Texas between science and the law. Add to that conflict the all-too-familiar problems of prosecutorial bias and tough-on-crime politics, and you’ve got a recipe for wrongful conviction that, when death is involved, can’t ever be remedied.

In Swearingen’s case, the courts have demonstrated little tolerance for scientific questions that are not only central to his guilt or innocence, but that have implications for every single death investigation in the state. Until Texas courts— particularly the state’s highest criminal court, the Court of Criminal Appeals (CCA)—accept that understanding science is key to doing justice, the risk that innocent men and women will be locked up, or worse, is inevitable. And in the absence of such a eureka moment, Swearingen, whose latest execution date was February 27, will die despite serious unresolved questions about his guilt.

Swearingen was sent to death row for the kidnapping, rape and murder of 19-year-old Melissa Trotter, a community college student in Montgomery County, just north of Houston. Trotter disappeared from campus on December 8, 1998. Her body was found on January 2, in the piney woods of the Sam Houston National Forest. She had been strangled, a section of pantyhose knotted around her neck.

Although more than three weeks had passed since she disappeared, police were certain from the beginning she was dead, and equally certain they’d found the man who had murdered her: Larry Swearingen, a 27-year-old married electrician who had been among the last to see Trotter alive. The two were acquaintances and had spoken on campus the day she disappeared. Police arrested Swearingen on unrelated outstanding warrants three days after Trotter’s disappearance; he has been behind bars ever since.

* * *

Swearingen has always said he did not kill Trotter. His claim of innocence is supported by the opinion of a number of influential Texas pathologists—together responsible for thousands of death investigations every year—who say that scientific evidence proves that Trotter had not been dead very long when her body was found. If that’s the case, then Swearingen could not have killed her, since he would have been in jail when she died. The central question— low long Trotter had been dead—hinges on histology samples collected during her autopsy and saved in a paraffin block. Veteran pathologists who have reviewed the evidence agree that the samples of Trotter’s lung, heart and vascular tissues reveal intact structures that would have broken down  had her body really been left in the forest for nearly a month.

Even the Houston medical examiner who conducted the autopsy, Dr. Joye Carter, has recanted her trial testimony, admitting in 2007 that the ease with which she was able to weigh and dissect Trotter’s organs made the state’s timeline impossible.

Swearingen has faced the death chamber four times. In 2011, the CCA stayed his third execution date, sending the case back to Montgomery County for a hearing on the science determining when Trotter had died. The hearing lasted nine days, ending in March 2012, and featured experts who testified about the methods of determining a person’s time of death, and explained why well-preserved forensic samples taken from Trotter’s autopsy could only mean she was killed not long before January 2. The final transcripts had not yet been filed—nor had a mandatory hearing been held to determine the admissibility of such expert testimony—when Judge Fred Edwards, who had presided over the original trial, declared the science presented by the defense “junk.” Edwards sent the case back to the CCA, denying Swearingen relief. Last December 12, the CCA allowed Edwards to set another execution date, which he did the following day.

Swearingen’s lead attorney, James Rytting, has filed a motion to get the CCA to reconsider, arguing that the trial judge’s hasty actions, in violation of state statutes, have denied Swearingen’s right to due process.

* * *

In January, the Innocence Project filed an appeal seeking DNA testing in the case. Among the untested evidence that could exonerate Swearingen is the pantyhose ligature, which was certainly handled by Trotter’s killer.

Swearingen has sought DNA testing before, but his most recent request, in 2010, was denied by the CCA. The court ruled that for tests to be performed, he must first prove that the items in question contain biological material—something he cannot do without testing. This Catch-22 prompted Texas lawmakers to modify the state’s post-conviction DNA statute in 2011, broadening the definition of what constitutes “biological material.”

Judge Edwards was ousted in an election last year, and the judge who replaced him has put Swearingen’s execution on hold until the DNA testing request can be decided. Finality, he told lawyers in February, must not trump certainty.

Had Melissa Trotter been killed today, it is hard to imagine that Swearingen would be facing execution without the alleged murder weapon or other evidence first being subjected to DNA testing. The use of science, and DNA in particular, in criminal cases has advanced greatly since 1999. “This is evidence that would routinely be tested if the case was investigated today, and any one of these pieces of evidence could produce a DNA profile that could lead to another perpetrator,” says Bryce Benjet, who is working with the Innocence Project on Swearingen’s behalf. “Regardless of where you stand on the death penalty, I think we can all agree that we should be absolutely certain of guilt before putting someone to death.”

Of course, Texas’ efficient death machinery doesn’t necessarily discriminate between the certainly guilty and the probably or even possibly so. Finality of conviction has long been the force driving justice in Texas, especially as practiced from the bench of the CCA. But DNA has already exonerated forty-seven inmates in Texas—one of them on death row—and inspired efforts to ensure better certainty in convictions, in the state and beyond. Whether the court will accept and apply such science in Swearingen’s case—or in the cases of any of the twelve other inmates scheduled for execution in 2013—remains an open question.

Courtesy: The Nation

Larry Swearingen

Execution: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 at 6 p.m.

Ninth Texas District Court Judge, Fred Edwards set Swearingen's latest execution date after the state Court of Criminal Appeals rejected the convict's most recent appeal. Swearingen was convicted in the June, 2000 of the abduction and murder of college student Melissa Trotter.  He has since been sentenced to die by lethal injection on three occasions – January 2007, January 2009 and August 2011. He was granted stays as his claim of innocence wound its way through the appellate courts. Swearingen's latest stay came Jan. 30, 2013, when a judge struck the execution date of Feb. 27 to allow for further DNA testing. Swearingen is scheduled to die by lethal injection at 6 p.m. Feb. 27 in the Texas Department of Corrections' Walls Unit in downtown Huntsville.

Courtesy: Execution Watch

Mentally disabled Georgia inmate granted stay of execution

Warren Lee Hill: undated Georgia Department of Corrections Photograph

Just 30 minutes before a scheduled execution, a federal appeals court has halted the lethal injection of a mentally disabled death row prisoner in Georgia.
 

The 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals issued the ruling for Warren Lee Hill after his defense team and human rights activists demanded a last-minute intervention, arguing that the man cannot be executed due his mental status.

“We are greatly relieved that the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals has stayed the execution of Warren Hill, a person with mental retardation. All the doctors who have examined Mr. Hill are unanimous in their diagnosis of mental retardation," said defense attorney Brian Kammer.

Earlier in the day, the state parole board, the Supreme Court of Georgia and the US Supreme Court had all declined to stop the execution.

Hill was convicted more than 20 years of murdering a fellow inmate while already behind bars for slaying his girlfriend.

Back in 1991, the judge overseeing the murder case against Hill said the defendant was “mentally retarded” by a “preponderance of the evidence,” contradicting testimonies from physicians who examined the inmate. Decades later, though, those doctors who examined Hill say they acted in too much of a hurry to reach that conclusion and today agree that the inmate is unfit for execution.

Hill was expected to be killed last July, but a last minute hold was granted to reassess the method of execution only an hour and a half before he was scheduled to die.

Courtesy: www.rt.com

Delhi on high alert after three suspicious-looking bags found

This was expected and I had mentioned this multiple times (that this could happen) before and  post the hanging of Afzal Guru.....

Photo: CNN IBN

Three suspicion-evoking bags were recovered in the capital Monday, one each from outside an army hospital and two city markets, the police said.

Officials said the bags seized from two south Delhi markets were harmless. However, they were waiting for forensic reports before concluding if any explosive device was present in the bag found near the Base Hospital in Delhi Cantonment around 2.50 pm.

"We are yet to ascertain if there is any bomb inside the bag," said Additional Commissioner of Police Anil Kumar Ojha.

"A National Security Guard team and Central Forensic Science Laboratory team reached the spot and handled the bag. Before getting the forensic report, we can't say that there was any explosive device in the bag," added Ojha.

Initial inquiry suggested that a youth threw a bag near the army hospital in the afternoon and fled on a bike, said a police officer.

Ojha said another abandoned bag was found in the cantonment's Gopinath Market around 3 pm, but it was found to be carrying papers.

The third suspicion-evoking bag was found on a motorcycle in south Delhi's Greater Kailash-I area around 5.30 pm.

"A police team cordoned off the area and after a check declared that nothing suspicious was present in the bag," another officer said.

The officer said the motorcycle and bag owner also reached the spot after the bag was searched.

Courtesy:  DNA India

Hyderabad Serial Blasts: Twelve Killed, Several Injured

[It was expected from the day, Afzal Guru was hanged. If the government of India and the main opposition party tread the wrong path on an important issue, then this is what is expected. If the government bends down due to public pressure, then governance becomes a question mark. I have warned a number of times, but then how to control insane masses? Now I would like to question those Pundits who said, "Capital Punishment Acts As A Deterrent"!! What happened to their great theories of  "Creating Fear in the Minds of Terrorists" to stop further heinous crimes, from being committed? History has shown time and again that, it is not possible to stop a person who is determined to die and many people commit crime out of impulse, which majority of persons repent later. But I do not know why the educated Indians do not want to  understand this simple truth. I do not know why the media fellows like Arnab Goswami, Times Now, does not want to accept this simple fact!! Actually, the irony is that, in this country, even a school going girl starts advising the government on important issues like rape, without adequate research or understanding. Therefore, these kinds of sad incidents continues to happen again and again. The things which needs brains cannot be solved using force. This is a wrong concept, which even Joseph Stalin tried and failed. Why don't the government employ specialists to solve such nagging problem and pay them hefty amounts as rewards?]

Photo, Courtesy: Reuters

HYDERABAD: Terror struck Hyderabad when 12 people were killed and over 50 injured tonight when two powerful near simultaneous blasts ripped through a crowded area close to a cluster of bus stands in Dilsukhnagar area.
The blasts triggered by Improvised Explosive Devices(IED) tied to two bicyles took place in the peak hour at two sites 100 to 150 metres apart outside a roadside eatery near Konark and Venkatadiri theatres in the area located on the Hyderabad-Vijaywada national highway in Cyberabad police limits.
The twin blasts, described as dastardly by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, triggered a stampede-like situation with people trying to scamper for safety as it left a bloody trail.
The scene wore a gory look with severed body parts lying around. Footwear and various other objects were also seen indicating the desperation of the victims and the injured to flee the spot.
The Dilsukhnagar area is thickly populated and traffic jams are routine in the evenings with officegoers and students rushing home. Large numbers of people wait at the numerous bus shelters, eateries and shops in the area.
Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde said eight people were killed in the first blast and three in the second and that the toll may rise. Fifty persons were injured, he said in Delhi.
The state DGP V Dinesh Reddy said IEDs were used in the blast but refused to hazard a guess as to who could be behind them. Asked whether any terror groups were involved, Reddy said, We don't know. Only investigations will reveal."
Shinde said two bombs were placed within a radius of 100 to 150 metres and placed in two bicycles. The first bomb went off at 7.01 PM followed by the other five minutes later, police said. Earlier reports spoke of a third explosion.
The injured have been rushed to various hospitals by ambulances and police and bomb disposal squads swung into action and began searches.
Shinde spoke of intelligence inputs for the last two days which was shared with all the states but there was no specific information "like this".
Official sources said a general alert was issued for two consecutive days from February 19 to all major cities suggesting a possible attack by Pakistani-based terror groups to avenge the hangings of Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru and Mumbai attack convict Ajmal Kasab.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh condemned the blasts, saying those behind the dastardly act will not go unpunished.
A team of National Security Guards(NSG) was being rushed to Hyderabad.
The previous major attack in Hyderabad was on August 25, 2007 when two blasts took place almost simultaneously in which 42 people were killed. The first blast was in Lumbini amusement park followed by another at an eating joint. In the same year, there was a blast at the famous Mecca Masjid in which nine people were killed.
Union Home Secretary R K Singh said a NSG team is leaving from Delhi by a BSF aircraft. A team of NIA hub stationed in Hyderabad has also rushed to the spot. There were reports that the bomb blast could be heard two to three kms away from the site of the explosion.
Sources in the state-run Osmania General Hospital said of the around 30 injured people admitted some of them were in a serious condition. They said three bodies were received brought dead.
Official sources said 14 blast victims were admitted to private Yashoda hospital at Malakpet. In another private hospital, 18 injured persons were admitted.
S A Huda, Additional DGP (law and order) said the bomb blasts occurred at two places both in the Dilsukhnagar area falling within the Cyberabad Commissionerate.
Terrible scenes were seen at the hospital as blood soaked injured persons, some of them grievously, being treated and their relatives wailing.
Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy and Home Minister P Sabita Reddy also rushed to the spot.
The Dilsukhnagar area witnessed a blast in 2002 near a famous Saibaba temple in which two persons were killed and over 20 injured.

Courtesy: Economic Times

Mentally Disabled US Man Faces Execution Tomorrow

A mentally-handicapped man is to be put to death in the US state of Georgia tomorrow, despite protests from human rights activists and mental health advocates calling the execution a miscarriage of justice.
Warren Hill, a 52-year-old African American, is reported to have an IQ of 70, putting him below the threshold for mental disability."There is no dispute among the experts that Mr Hill is mentally retarded," attorney Brian Kammer wrote in an appeal seeking leniency for his client."Because Mr Hill's execution would be a fundamental miscarriage of justice, this Court must stay Mr Hill's imminent execution and vacate his death sentence," he added in another appeal.

Warren Lee Hill

After spending the last 21 years on death row for killing a fellow inmate, Hill was scheduled to die last July.However, the execution was put on hold for several months due to a change in how the killing was to be carried out.Hill is to be the first in the state to receive a single deadly dose of pentobarbital, instead of the previously standard three-drug lethal cocktail.At the time, the state supreme court ruled unanimously to grant a stay of execution, saying it needed to investigate whether a lower court erred in determining that the change in execution protocol was legal under Georgia law.
The US Supreme Court ruled against the execution of prisoners with mental disabilities in 2002, but left each state with the authority to determine what constitutes mental disability.Georgia has the strictest standard of any US state when it comes to determining this, with courts requiring "proof of retardation beyond a reasonable doubt" -- a burden that some mental health professionals say is almost impossible to meet. 

"While Georgia never contested Mr Hill's intellectual disability or IQ of 70, he was not able to meet the burden of proof," Eric Jacobson, the Executive Director of the Georgia Council on Developmental Disabilities wrote in an online editorial this week condemning the sentence.However, according to Kammer, the "uniform position of all experts in this case is that Mr Hill is mentally retarded."Three doctors who had previously testified in favour of the state's position, wrote in a statement under oath that their initial evaluation was "extremely and unusually rushed" and "not conducive to an accurate assessment of Mr Hill's condition."Hill was originally serving a life sentence in prison for murdering his girlfriend. While in prison, he bludgeoned a fellow inmate to death with a nail-studded board -- the crime for which he received the death penalty.

Courtesy: Indian Express

Four Veerappan Associates To be Executed Tomorrow?

Delhi-based Manisha Sethi of the Jamia Teachers' Solidarity Association, which has been campaigning against death penalty, said that the government had decided to hang the four convicts only to prove that they had not selectively targeted Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru, who was executed last Saturday. "The murder of Afzal Guru is now going to be justified with many more murders," she said.

As security around the Hindalaga Central Prison in Belgaum, Karnataka has been tightened, rumours are abuzz that the four associates of forest brigand Veerappan may be hanged on Sunday.

President Pranab Mukherjee recently rejected the mercy petition of the four aides, who had been sentenced to death for killing 22 people in a landmine blast at Palar in Karnataka in 1993.  

On Saturday evening, the four associates -- Simon, Gnana Prakash, Madhiah and Bilavandra -- moved the Supreme Court against the death penalty. However, the SC did not take up the plea for hearing saying there is no proof that execution will take place on Sunday, say lawyers of Veerappan's aides.

Speaking on the phone from Bangalore, Deputy Inspector General (Prisons) VS Raja said that the date of execution was confidential and could not be revealed.

One of the members of the team of lawyers defending them, Mumbai-based Yug Mohit Chaudhry, said that lawyers in Belgaum were denied access to the four accused. 

Veerappan’s associates were given life imprisonment by a TADA court for the landmine blast, but the Supreme Court had enhanced this to death penalty in 2004.

"Outside the prison, the lawyers were informed that some prisoners are going to be executed the following morning and therefore nobody will be allowed to meet them. They were further informed that preparations are being made for the execution. Presently, the entire area outside the prison has been cordoned off by the police and no movement is being permitted in the vicinity," said Chaudhry.

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According to a report in the Deccan Chronicle, the Hindalaga Central Prison is likely to hang three of them one day and the fourth the next as the gallows at the prison have only three hanging ropes.

Raja said that there was no provision to let the lawyers meet the four convicts once the death sentence had been confirmed.

Chaudhry, however, said, "This is complete nonsense. It is their right to ask the court for a judicial review of the rejection of their mercy petition, considering that the rejection took nine years. How are we to file a review petition if we can't meet them and take their signatures on the affidavits?"

The Supreme Court, in Kehar Singh vs Union of India (1989) and in B P Singhal vs Union of India (2010) has held that the orders of the President under Article 72 of the Constitution are subject to judicial review. 

The Karnataka high court has stayed the execution of another death row convict, Saibanna, on January 22 on the grounds of delay in deciding on the mercy petition.

Chaudhry also said that according to the jail manual they cannot be hanged before 14 days have passed since the rejection of the mercy petition, but DIG Raja denied this was the case. "An utterly heartless state wants more blood on its hands," said the lawyer.

Delhi-based Manisha Sethi of the Jamia Teachers' Solidarity Association, which has been campaigning against death penalty, said that the government had decided to hang the four convicts only to prove that they had not selectively targeted Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru, who was executed last Saturday. "The murder of Afzal Guru is now going to be justified with many more murders," she said.

Shivam Vij in New Delhi

Courtesy: Rediff.com

Bal Thackeray's green memorial takes root

Officials start to level the 20x40-feet patch of land that will be made into a landscaped garden in honour of late Sena patriarch; the project will take one-and-a-half months to complete

After conducting a low-key bhoomi pujan ceremony on February 6, labourers from the BMC’s Garden Department began work in earnest on Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray’s memorial the very next day, two months after his demise.

Work began on the small plot at Shivaji Park near Shivaji’s statue on the grounds. The memorial will span across 20x40-feet patch of land and a clay statue of around 5x8 feet will be build by the civic body. The land will be made into a landscaped garden with green shrubs and other plants. The plan passed by the municipal commissioner clearly states that no civil structure will be built on the ground.

This memorial was completely ideated and will be executed by the civic body without the help of any architect, as in the case of other memorials. Officials said that the estimated cost of the project would be Rs 6 lakh. Authorities said that the memorial would take around a month-and-a-half to complete.

Deputy Superintendent Gardens (City), said, “There was no need to give any work order as the work of development was going to be done by us (the garden department). There will be greenery all round and small shrubs and plants will be present in the garden. The approximate cost will be approximately Rs 6 lakh.”

When MiD DAY spoke to Mayor Sunil Prabhu, asking why it would take so long for the memorial to be put up, he said, “The work would take a month-and-a-half as work needs to be done properly. The memorial is our Saheb’s memorial and so, we don’t mind if another month or so is taken by the civic body to complete it.”

Courtesy: Mid-day

Afzal Guru’s family snubs India’s offer to visit jail grave

A tomb stone for Afzal Guru (L), is seen at the Martyrs Graveyard in Srinagar on February 12, 2013, and reads, “His mortal remains are lying in trust with the government of India, the Kashmiri nation awaits its return.” Guru, a native of Indian-administered Kashmir, was executed on February 9, 2013 over his role in a deadly attack on parliament in New Delhi in 2001. A former fruit seller, he was hanged at Tihar Jail on the outskirts of the capital after his final appeal for mercy was rejected by President Pranab Mukherjee. — AFP Photo

NEW DELHI: The family of Mohammed Afzal Guru who was executed over the weekend has rejected an offer by Indian authorities to pray at his graveside inside a prison, insisting the body be buried in his home state.

Home Secretary R.K. Singh made the offer Tuesday and said that the belongings of Mohammed Afzal Guru, an Indian Muslim who was executed and buried at Tihar Jail on Saturday for his role in the deadly 2001 Indian parliament attack, would be handed over to his family members.

“We have no problem if the immediate family of Afzal Guru wants to come and offer prayers at his grave in Tihar jail. Belongings of Afzal will be returned to the family,” Singh told reporters in Delhi.

However a relative of Guru said that the family had no intention of visiting his grave, insisting that the body be brought back to his home in Indian-administered Kashmir.

“As Muslims we can pray for Afzal from here,” the separatist’s cousin Yasin Guru told AFP from the family’s hometown of Sopore in the Kashmir Valley.

“We will go to Tihar only if the government of India is kind enough to hand us his body for burial here.”

The announcement comes amid criticism of the government for failing to inform the family about the execution before he went to the gallows.

A letter sent from the government announcing that his mercy plea had been rejected only arrived at the family’s home on Monday morning.

Indian-administered Kashmir’s Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, normally an ally of the government, has been among those criticising the handling of the execution, saying he found it “very difficult” to reconcile himself to the fact that Guru was not given the opportunity to see his family for the last time.

Guru was convicted of helping a group of militants plot an 2001 attack on the Indian parliament which left 10 people dead.

He always maintained his innocence and many of his supporters accused police of framing evidence against him in the case.

A curfew has been in place since Saturday throughout much of Indian-administered Kashmir.

 There have also been protests in Pakistani-administered Kashmir.

A burial plot, complete with a headstone, has been prepared for Guru in the so-called ‘Martyrs’ Graveyard’ in Srinagar, the main city in Indian-administered Kashmir.

The inscription reads: “His mortal remains are lying in trust with the government of India, the Kashmiri nation awaits its return,” according to an AFP photographer who has seen the tombstone.

Courtesty: Dawn.com

We only demand Afzal Guru's body to be returned to us, says family

[The morning that Afzal Guru was to be executed, he wrote a letter to his wife, Tabassum. Written in Urdu, he handed it over to jail officials before he was marched out for his execution. "He pressed the letter into the jail superintendent's hand just before he was asked to step out of his cell. All he said was that it was meant for his wife and to please ensure that it reached her safely," said a senior Tihar official. The Tihar Jail officials said that Afzal in the letter to his wife, only wrote about family matters. "It was an extremely personal letter where he told his wife to take care of their son and not agonize over his death. In very gently worded language, he said that she should remain strong for their son and not give in to despair. As ever, Guru was calm and dignified in his parting words," said a source. Afzal Guru, a medical college dropout and resident of Sopore in north Kashmir, was executed at 8 am on Saturday, (9th February, 2013) and buried in the prison premises. "He did not spend a sleepless night before his execution. He was one of the most model prisoners in jail, and did not create any trouble till the last," said a senior Tihar official~~Indrani Basu, TNN]

The family of Parliament attack convict Mohammad Afzal Guru today said their only demand was that the Centre return his body to enable them to give him a proper burial.
"We have no other demand...the only thing we want is that Afzal's body be returned to us," Mohammad Yasin, a cousin of Afzal said.

He said the family has written a letter to Tihar jail authorities as well as Deputy Commissioner Baramulla seeking that Guru's body be given to them.
"Soon after we came to know about the hanging, we wrote letters to Deputy Commissioner Baramulla and Tihar Jail authorities for return of the body," Yasin said, adding, they were awaiting a response from the concerned authorities on the matter.

Asked about Union Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde's statement that government can consider allowing the family to offer 'fatiha' (prayer) on Afzal's grave, Yasin said it was of no use.

"Where will we offer faitha? We want to bury him here (in Sopore)," he said.

On reports that Afzal's family might be airlifted to Delhi for the purpose of visiting Afzal's grave, he said the family would go on their own if the situation comes to that.

"We will go to Delhi on our own, if it comes to that. We do not want any largesse from the Government. The only thing we want from them is to return Afzal's body," he said.

He termed as "cruel joke" the letter received yesterday from Tihar Jail authorities informing the family about Afzal's hanging.

"The arrival of the letter yesterday was like rubbing salt into open wounds of the family...the wounds which may never heal," Yasin said.

He alleged that the leaders of the country were playing politics over the death of Afzal.

"Afzal was hanged -- rightly or wrongly, we don't want to go into that -- but politicians should stop playing politics with it," he said.

Courtesy: Indian Express

Post Afzal hanging, rights groups demand India end executions

PTI : Feb 10, 2013

NEW YORK/LONDON: In the wake of the hanging of Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru, global rights groups have asked India to end the use of executions and move towards abolishing the death penalty.
"Questions need to be asked why the Indian government executed Afzal Guru now," New York-based Human Rights Watch's South Asia director Meenakshi Ganguly said.
"No one argues that those who engage in serious crimes shouldn't be punished, but the death penalty is brutal and irreversible, and there is no convincing evidence to suggest it serves as a deterrent," Ganguly said.
The group said it opposes the death penalty in all circumstances as an inherently irreversible, inhumane punishment.
The hanging of Guru comes just three months after India executed the lone surviving 26/11 terrorist Ajmal Kasab in a Pune jail.
"India should end this distressing use of executions as a way to satisfy some public opinion," said Ganguly.
"It should instead join the nations that have chosen to abolish capital punishment," she said.
Guru's execution makes it more urgent for India to reinstate its previous informal moratorium on executions as a step towards abolishing the death penalty, the rights group added.
Meanwhile, London-based Amnesty International has also expressed concern over Afzal's execution.
"We condemn the execution in the strongest possible terms. This very regrettably puts India in opposition to the global trend towards moving away from death penalty", said Shashikumar Velath, Programmes Director at Amnesty International India.
He alleged "serious questions have been raised about the fairness of Afzal Guru's trial. He did not receive legal representation of his choice or a lawyer with adequate experience at the trial stage. These concerns were not addressed".
"Before Ajmal Kasab's execution in November, Indian authorities used to make information about the rejection of mercy petitions and dates of execution available to the public prior to any executions. The new practice of carrying out executions in secret is highly disturbing," Velath said.
Guru was executed early yesterday for providing logistical support in the attack on the Indian parliament in December 2001, in which five heavily-armed gunmen entered the complex and opened fire indiscriminately, killing nine, including six security personnel, two parliament guards, and a gardener. All five attackers were also killed. 

Courtesy: The Times of India

India: Secret Hanging a Major Step Back

“Questions need to be asked why the Indian government executed Afzal Guru now. No one argues that those who engage in serious crimes shouldn’t be punished, but the death penalty is brutal and irreversible, and there is no convincing evidence to suggest it serves as a deterrent.”
~~Meenakshi Ganguly, South Asia director

(New York) –The hanging in New Delhi of Mohammad Afzal Guru makes it more urgent for India to reinstate its previous informal moratorium on executions as a step towards abolishing the death penalty, Human Rights Watch said today. Azfal Guru, executed on February 9, 2013, was convicted for his role in the attack on the Indian parliament in 2001.

In November 2012, India ended its eight-year unofficial moratorium on executions when it hanged Ajmal Kasab, convicted for his role in the 2008 Mumbai attacks.

“Questions need to be asked why the Indian government executed Afzal Guru now,” said Meenakshi Ganguly, South Asia director. “No one argues that those who engage in serious crimes shouldn’t be punished, but the death penalty is brutal and irreversible, and there is no convincing evidence to suggest it serves as a deterrent.”

Under Indian law, the death penalty is supposed to be carried out only in the “rarest of rare” cases.

Afzal Guru was convicted for providing logistical support to those involved in the attack on the Parliament building in New Delhi on December 13, 2001, in which five heavily-armed gunmen entered the complex and opened fire indiscriminately, killing nine, including six security personnel, two parliament guards, and a gardener. All five attackers, later identified as Pakistani nationals, were killed. No member of parliament was hurt.

Four people, including Afzal Guru, were charged with conspiring in the attack and waging war. In December 2002, three people,Syed Abdul Rahman Geelani, Shaukat Hussain Guru, and Afzal Guru, were sentenced to death. The fourth, Afsan Guru, was acquitted. Geelani was acquitted on appeal. In August 2005 the Supreme Court commuted Shaukat Hussain’s sentence to 10 years in prison but confirmed the death sentence of Afzal Guru. An appeal for clemency was filed for Afzal Guru but was rejected by President Pranab Mukherjee on February 3.

Many Indian activists and lawyers have claimed that Azfal Guru did not receive proper legal representation. He did not have a lawyer from the time of his arrest until he confessed in police custody. Azfal Guru claimed that he had been tortured into making his confession, which he later retracted. Several Indian activists and senior lawyers have said that he did not have effective assistance of counsel.

The Indian government has defended the conviction, saying that Azfal Guru was able to appeal his conviction and that his claims were rejected by higher courts.Human Rights Watch opposes the death penalty in all circumstances as an inherently irreversible, inhumane punishment. In July 2012, 14 retired Supreme Court and High Court judges asked the president to commute the death sentences of 13 inmates they said had been erroneously upheld by the Supreme Court over the past nine years. This followed the court’s admission that some of these death sentences were rendered per incuriam (out of error or ignorance). In November 2012 the Supreme Court ruled that the “rarest of rare” standard for capital punishment had not been applied uniformly over the years and the norms on the death penalty needed “a fresh look.”

“India should end this distressing use of executions as a way to satisfy some public opinion,” said Ganguly. “It should instead join the nations that have chosen to abolish capital punishment.”

Courtest: Human Rights Watch

For A Moratorium On Death Sentence

~~V. Venkatesan
There is a need to identify cases in which the courts might have erred in applying the Bachan Singh principle that limits the imposition of the death penalty

The Supreme Court’s five-judge Constitution Bench judgment in Bachan Singh (1980) is the source of contemporary death penalty jurisprudence in India. Its major contribution was to limit the imposition of death penalty to the rarest of rare crimes, and for laying down the principle that the courts must impose the death sentence on a convict only if the alternative sentence of life imprisonment is unquestionably foreclosed. For achieving these twin objectives, the court held that judges must consider the aggravating features of the crime, as well as the mitigating factors of the criminal.

However, the application of its principles by the courts to various cases before them has been very uneven, and inconsistent. This has naturally led to the criticism that the jurisprudence suffers from a judge-centric approach, rather than a principles-centric approach.

Matter of concern:

It is a matter of concern when this criticism emanates from the judiciary itself, as it smacks of its helplessness. The frequency of such criticism from the judiciary may appear to be exercises in genuine introspection but to the litigants, the very credibility of the court’s death penalty decisions is at stake.

The execution of death row prisoners in India might have come to a near standstill, with only one in the last decade, and another recently. Yet, the frequency of confirmation of death sentences by the Supreme Court has created a large pool of death row prisoners in the country, who may be living between life and death constantly for many years, till the executive decides on their mercy petitions. When the Supreme Court time and again admits that many of these prisoners might have been sentenced on the basis of erroneous legal precedents set by itself, the executive cannot pretend to be unconcerned.

The latest admission of such error is to be found in the judgment delivered by Justice Madan B. Lokur for himself and on behalf of Justice K.S. Radhakrishnan, in Sangeet & ANR vs. State of Haryana, on November 20.

The genesis of Sangeet can be traced to another Supreme Court judgment delivered in 2009. In Santosh Kumar Satishbhushan Bariyar v. State of Maharashtra, a two-judge Bench admitted to error in the sentencing to death of seven convicts by the previous benches of the court. Similar error was immediately noticed in the sentencing to death of six more convicts, after the delivery of judgment in Bariyar, taking their total to 13.

The error was the reliance by the court on a legal precedent, which Bariyar declared as per incuriam. The term, per incuriam, refers to a decision which a subsequent court finds to be a mistake, occurring through ignorance of a relevant authority, and therefore not a binding precedent.

Erroneous precedent:

The erroneous legal precedent was Ravji v. State of Rajasthan, decided in 1996 by a two-judge Bench. In Ravji, the court had found only characteristics relating to the crime, to the exclusion of the criminal, as relevant to sentencing. Bariyar noted with disapproval that the court had relied on Ravji as an authority on the point that in heinous crimes, circumstances relating to the criminal are not pertinent, in six cases. This was inconsistent with the Bachan Singh ruling by the five-Judge Constitution Bench in 1980, which had shifted the focus of sentencing from the “crime” to the “crime and the criminal”.

In Sangeet, the Radhakrishnan-Lokur Bench has continued the judicial scrutiny started by Bariyar of post-Bachan Singh death penalty cases, to see if they have complied with the requirements of the law. Thanks to this scrutiny, five other cases which resulted in the wrongful sentencing to death of six more convicts have come to light. They are Shivu, Jadeswamy, B.A. Umesh, Rajendra Pralhadrao Wasnik, Mohd. Mannan, and Sushil Murmu. The former President, Pratibha Patil, has already commuted Murmu’s death sentence to life imprisonment.

Back to 13:

Five of the 13 convicts identified in and after Bariyar have already got their sentences commuted to life imprisonment by competent authorities. With Sangeet pointing to five more such convicts, the total number of prisoners to be taken off the death row is back to 13 again.

Unlike Bariyar, however, Sangeet has not declared the five erroneous judgments per incuriam. But the result of the scrutiny in both the cases is the same: no future Bench can cite these cases on a point of law, without inviting the Ravji taint. The recent appeal by 14 former judges to the President to spare the lives of the eight convicts, who have been wrongly sentenced to death by the Supreme Court must, therefore, apply equally to these five convicts identified in Sangeet.

It is not unusual to come across observations by the courts while justifying the death sentence, that there is extreme indignation of the community over the nature of the crime, and that collective conscience of the community is petrified by the extremely brutal, grotesque, diabolical, revolting or dastardly manner of the commission of the crime. After making these observations, it is easy for the courts to jump to the conclusion that the criminal is a menace to society and shall continue to be so and he cannot be reformed.

These are empty clichés repeated ad nauseam without any basis. Sangeet, therefore, gently reminds the courts about the need to back such observations with some material. The nature of the crime alone cannot form such material, it has held.

Sangeet has pointed out a grave infirmity with regard to the sentencing of Umesh and Sushil Murmu, to death. The Supreme Court found both Umesh and Sushil Murmu incapable of rehabilitation and, therefore, deserving of the death sentence because of their alleged involvement in crimes other than those for which they were convicted — turning upside down the doctrine of presumption of innocence, the cornerstone of our criminal jurisprudence.

Bachan Singh, delivered by a five-judge Constitution Bench, clearly discarded the proposition that the court must balance aggravating and mitigating circumstances through a balance sheet theory. The theory requires weighing aggravating factors of the crime against the mitigating factors of the criminal. In Machhi Singh (1983), however, a three-judge Supreme Court Bench, brought the balance sheet theory back, and gave it legitimacy. The theory has held the field post-Machhi Singh.

Sangeet has sought to revive the Bachan Singh dictum that the aggravating circumstances of the crime and the mitigating circumstances of the criminal are completely distinct and different elements, and cannot be compared with one another. Therefore, it has held that a balance sheet cannot be drawn up of two distinct and different constituents of an incident, as required by Machhi Singh.

Sangeet holds the balance sheet theory responsible for much of the arbitrariness in judging whether a case falls under the rarest of rare category, a test enunciated in Bachan Singh. It also endorses the proposition that by standardising and categorising crimes, Machhi Singh considerably enlarged the scope for imposing the death penalty, that was greatly restricted by Bachan Singh.

The Radhakrishnan-Lokur Bench, being a two-judge Bench, could not have overruled Machhi Singh, despite its obvious flaws, and the source of much of the inconsistency in our death penalty jurisprudence. A three-judge bench in Swami Shraddhanand II in 2008 had raised similar doubts about Machhi Singh; but the courts continue to invoke it.

In its judgment delivered on August 29, among other things, the Supreme Court relied on the flawed Machhi Singh for its reasoning, and used the balance sheet theory, arraigned by Sangeet, to sentence Ajmal Kasab.

The serious issues raised in Sangeet are incapable of being resolved by the judiciary itself. Any delay in their resolution will inexorably create more death row convicts, than what is justified legally. There is indeed a case for the government to immediately announce a moratorium on executing death sentences and set up a Commission to identify the cases in which any of the courts — trial courts, high courts and the Supreme Court — might have erred in correctly applying the Bachan Singh principles, while sentencing. The findings of the Commission will be useful for deciding the future of death sentence in the country. 

Courtesy: The Hindu