Lankan maid on Saudi death row hangs on for hope of life

We are waiting for the green signal from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Embassy in Sri Lanka to tell us what would be final verdict of Rizana Nafeek who killed a Saudi child while she was a domestic maid in Saudi Arabia in 2007,” Sri Lanka’s Bureau of Foreign Employment (SLBFE) Chairman Amal Senalankadhikara told Emirates 24|7.

The maid is currently in jail where she has been for the past seven years after her conviction.

“So far we have not get any news from the Saudi embassy here,” he said.

When asked about Justice Minister Rauff Hakeem who has spoken to the Saudi ambassador in Sri Lanka regarding Rizana, the chairman said, “Yes I heard, but we are not 100% sure as the embassy has not announced about her release.”

He added, “The parents of the girl have approached us, the embassy and the justice ministry and we have inquired several times, but yet we have not got a positive answer.”

“We don’t know how the minister handled it, but we have not been informed of any progress on the matter as yet from the Saudi embassy in Sri Lanka.”

“The SLBFE, the Saudi embassy, Western Province Governor Alawi Moulana and the Justice Minister took up the matter several times.

“It seems the husband is willing to pardon Rizana but the mother of the child who was killed by Rizana is not. So there are issues pertaining to these matters and the embassy should bring us the good news about Rizana future.”

The Daily Mirror reported last week that the Saudi Arabia Ambassador in Sri Lanka, Abdulaziz bin Abdulrahman Al Jammaz, had said to Minister of Justice Rauff Hakeem that according to information received by the ambassador, Rizana Nafeek who is presently on death row in Saudi Arabia would be pardoned and could return to the island, in consideration of a request made to the Saudi King by Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa.

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Source: Emirates247, January 6, 2013

The imminent danger of the execution of Rizana Nafeek

According to the news received from Saudi Arabia Rizana Nafeek, who has been the Dawadami Prison since 2005 may be executed at any moment. This was revealed to the BBC Sinhala Service by Dr. Kifaya Iftekhar, who is based in Saudi Arabia and who has been looking after the interests of Rizana for several years now. Dr. Iftekhar also said that the Sri Lankan government has been informed by the Saudi authorities of the possibility of her impending execution.

For several months now the Sri Lankan government has been reporting that moves are underway for Rizana's release and that this may happen at any time. However, it appears that these announcements were made only to appease the strong expressions of concern by the Sri Lankan and international community's who are calling for her release. The government has not been able to conduct diplomatic negotiations with the family on the deceased infant that has the power to grant pardon. Such pardon is usually granted either on the payment of blood money or without such payment by the generosity of the family.

Dr. Iftekhar told the BBC Sinhala Service that there is still room for assisting Rizana Nafeek and saving her life.

The Asian Human Rights Commission has campaigned for Rizana's release since 2007 when her case was brought to the notice of the world. A vast movement arose within Sri Lanka to demand her release and there was also massive support for her release from the human rights community and particularly from women's movements. Many signature campaigns were conducted on her behalf and websites opened by various concerned groups to rally support for her.

The Asian Human Rights Commission once again calls upon everyone to intervene and write to the Saudi authorities urging them to grant Rizana pardon.

We once again call upon the president of Sri Lanka and the Sri Lankan authorities to take effective action to conduct negotiations and also to renew diplomatic efforts to save her.

Source: Asian Human Rights Commission, January 6, 2013

Florida Set to Execute Man Who Said He Killed to Reach Death Row, Challenging Misconception that Death Penalty Deters Crime

Florida is scheduled to execute James Robertson at noon on Tuesday, October 13, at Florida State Prison. His execution remains scheduled despite the withdrawal of William Lee Thompson’s death warrant, which had called for a 2nd execution that evening. If completed, this will be Florida’s 17th execution of 2026. Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (FADP) and partners will be holding a series of vigils and demonstrations across the state.

Tennessee | Republicans legislature to investigate other execution methods after failed lethal injections

Republican leaders in Tennessee’s legislature say they will investigate the reliability of lethal injection as an execution method after the state failed to execute two death row inmates in the span of five months. Gov. Bill Lee stopped the May execution of Tony Carruthers after a physician unsuccessfully attempted to insert intravenous lines to begin the lethal injection process for over an hour. Death row inmate Christa Pike survived two failed rounds of Tennessee’s lethal injection protocol on Sept. 30 before the execution was halted. Pike, who was sentenced to death for the 1995 murder of Colleen Slemmer, is receiving medical care in a Nashville hospital.

Christa Pike's Survival Wasn't a Miracle. That's What Should Scare Us.

What happened in Tennessee's execution chamber is one of the most common failures in medicine Christa Pike is awake. A week after Tennessee strapped her to a gurney and gave her two doses of pentobarbital , she is off the ventilator and speaking from a hospital bed, still shackled to it. Her lawyers call her recovery " medically unprecedented. " Legal scholars say she is the first person in American history to survive a lethal injection after the drug was actually given. I understand the impulse to make such claims. I consulted for Pike's legal team, but I have also spent three decades in operating rooms and intensive care units (ICUs), and I want to resist the word "unprecedented" and the word "miracle" that hovers just behind it.

What Tennessee wants to do next to Christa Pike is beyond grim

Christa Pike, the woman who survived two execution attempts in Tennessee earlier this week, remains hospitalized in critical condition, where presumably medical staff is at work trying to keep her alive. If she wakes from the coma she had entered, Tennessee officials want to start anew to inject lethal drugs into her seemingly too-small veins to kill her and carry out the state death warrant. Pike also is being treated for “significant injuries to both arms” sustained when two lethal injections of pentobarbital failed to kill her. If she dies, there will be no need to try again. As we know by now, Tennessee tried to put Pike to death Wednesday night by lethal injection for a murder she committed when she was 18. She would have been the first woman executed in the state in 200 years.

USA | Firing squad execution to be livestreamed, Pentagon says

The public will be able to watch the execution of a former US Army major by firing squad, US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth has said. A Defense Department official told the BBC the execution of Nidal Hasan, who shot dead 13 unarmed US soldiers at Fort Hood in 2009, would be livestreamed. It is believed it would be the first public execution in the US in almost a century. The decision to livestream it is "unprecedented in the modern era" and "on uncertain legal terrain", said John Mills, a lawyer who works with inmates sentenced to death.

Tennessee | Christa Pike’s lawyer says she has not regained consciousness since her failed execution

Christa Pike has remained unconscious and on a ventilator at a hospital in the four days since her failed execution in Tennessee, and her prognosis might not be known for days more, one of her lawyers said Sunday. Little has been released about Pike’s condition since Wednesday night’s execution attempt. She has since remained hospitalized under guard as doctors try to get the massive dose of the barbiturate pentobarbital out of her system. When asked whether she ever regained consciousness after the execution attempt, Assistant Federal Defender Stephen Ferrell, Pike’s lawyer, said on CNN’s “State of the Union”: “Not that I am aware of.”

Christa Pike: 4 Major Questions As She Returns to Death Row

As Christa Pike returns to death row after surviving Tennessee’s attempt to execute her, several questions remain about her case and what comes next. Pike, 50, was discharged from hospital and moved back to the Debra K. Johnson Rehabilitation Center, the women’s prison where she was housed for 30 years, her attorneys said on Saturday. She was hospitalized after surviving 2 doses of the lethal drug pentobarbital as Tennessee attempted to execute her on September 30. Pike was sentenced to death for the 1995 murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer, her classmate at a Job Corps training program in Knoxville, Tennessee. Pike was 18 at the time.

Opinion | I Know Christa Pike’s Medical History. What Tennessee Did Is Unforgivable.

Dr. Zivot is an anesthesiologist and intensive care physician. He consulted on Christa Pike’s case before her attempted execution. On Wednesday night, Christa Pike lay strapped to a gurney at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville while the State of Tennessee injected pentobarbital, a sedative that is lethal in high doses, into her veins. When the 1st dose did not kill her, the execution team gave her a 2nd. At one point, she told the room her arm felt as if it were about to burst. She was nearly correct. More than an hour after the procedure began, an ambulance was called. She was severely injured but still alive.

Florida executes James Robertson

STARKE, Fla. — A Florida prisoner who said he killed his cellmate specifically to get on death row was executed Tuesday, nearly 18 years after the attack. James Robertson, 63, declined to offer any last words before receiving a three-drug injection and was pronounced dead about 10 minutes later. It was a stark contrast to the failed execution of Christa Pike in Tennessee two weeks ago, where she was rushed to the hospital after surviving two lethal doses of pentobarbital.

After Christa Pike survives lethal injection, America's shameful botched executions

The US is one of the few Western nations that still permits the death penalty, carried out regularly in 27 states. And in a country where regional political culture strongly favours retributive justice, it is no wonder capital punishment remains an enduring part of the American legal system. But following Christa Pike's botched lethal injection last week, fresh questions are being raised over whether executing convicted murderers and rapists outweighs the risks of an innocent person being put to death, or of an execution going so badly that a prisoner is left to die in agony, or even survives the attempt.

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