Death Penalty News

AL-MUKALLA: A court in Houthi-held Sanaa on Tuesday condemned a women’s rights rights activist to death for spying, sparking an uproar in Yemen and abroad against the Iran-backed militia. Abdul Majeed Sabra, a Yemeni lawyer, told Arab News that the Specialized Criminal Court of First Instance in Sanaa sentenced Fatema Saleh Mohammed Al-Arwali, an activist and head of the Yemeni branch of the Arab League’s Arab Women Leadership Council, to death for gathering military intelligence and sending key Houthi locations to the Coalition to Restore Legitimacy in Yemen to be bombed.

Prosecutors in Japan are seeking the death penalty for the suspect in an arson attack in 2019 that killed 36 people in one of the country’s deadliest crimes for decades. Shinji Aoba, who was not arrested until he had recovered from the burns he sustained in the attack on an animation studio in Kyoto, admitted in court in September 2023 to starting the fire. However, lawyers for Aoba, who underwent a psychiatric evaluation before standing trial, entered a plea of not guilty, claiming a psychological disorder had rendered him incapable of distinguishing between right and wrong.

As one of only five states that executed people this year—and one of only seven states that sentenced people to death—Alabama remains an outlier in its continued use of the death penalty, according to the Death Penalty Information Center’s Year End Report . The death penalty’s nationwide decline continued in 2023, which DPIC reports is the ninth consecutive year with fewer than 30 people executed and fewer than 50 people sentenced to death. Alabama imposed three of this year’s 21 new death sentences. Two of the three were sentenced to death even though jurors did not agree that death was the appropriate sentence.

The inmate was charged with attempted murder and has been transferred to a different corrections facility in Tucson TUCSON, Ariz. — Derek Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer convicted in the killing of George Floyd, has returned to the prison where he was stabbed 22 times last month. The 47-year-old ex-cop’s lawyer told the Minneapolis Star Tribune Chauvin’s condition had improved to where he could be released from a Tucson, Ariz., hospital, but they remain “ very concerned” the federal penitentiary where he’s incarcerated will be unable to keep him safe.

PUTRAJAYA: A 76-year-old former security guard on death row was among nine men who saw their death sentences commuted to 30 years’ jail under the temporary jurisdiction accorded to the Federal Court by law. A five-member review panel chaired by Chief Justice Tengku Maimun Tuan Mat allowed the application by Jun Lam alias Chin Swee Kong under the Revision of the Sentence of Death and Imprisonment for Natural Life (Temporary Jurisdiction of the Federal Court) Act 2023.

An Iranian female LGBT activist arrived safely in an undisclosed country after her release from prison on bail following the cancellation of her death sentence. Zahra Sedighi-Hamedani, known as Sareh, “expresses her gratitude to all LGB activists who accompanied her on this difficult journey to freedom.” the Germany-based Iranian LGBT rights group 6Rang said in a statement on December 1. “She congratulates the LGBT community, activists and the global community who supported the #FreeSareh campaign,” it added.

Texas and Florida accounted for more than half of the executions this year, with Florida putting six inmates to death and Texas executing eight, according to a report by the Death Penalty Information Center. Only three other states conducted executions in 2023: Alabama (two), Missouri (four) and Oklahoma (four), according to a Dec. 1 press release. The last time that so few states conducted executions was in 2016 and 20 years ago, according to The Death Penalty in 2023: Year End Report .

Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO); December 3, 2023: Fereydoun Nasirinejad, a Baluch man on death row for drug-related charges, was executed in Jiroft Prison. According to information obtained by Iran Human Rights, a Baluch man was executed in Jiroft Prison on 4 December. His identity has been established as 35-year-old Fereydoun Nasirinejad who was sentenced to death for drug-related charges. Informed sources told Iran Human Rights that Fereydoun was a father of four who had been arrested for drug-related charges around four years ago.

Iranian media say the governorate of the central city of Qom has issued a directive mandating female employees in government offices adhere to strict Islamic dress codes, specifically wearing a black chador, a large piece of cloth that is wrapped around the head and upper body leaving only the face exposed, and refraining from using makeup. The directive, initially disclosed by the Iran Watch rights group's website, marks a further tightening of the Islamic republic's stance on how women can dress in the workplace.

A jobless man in China who hurled bricks from a high-rise building – one of which killed a woman on the street below – should be given the death penalty, prosecutors say. The man has admitted he had a grudge against society and was trying to kill indiscriminately so that he would be arrested and executed, according to a report by the news outlet cqcb.com. The tragedy happened on June 22 when the 28-year-old victim travelled to Changchun in China’s northeastern province of Jilin and visited a bustling snack street.

A new report by a human rights group which closely follows how many prisoners are executed in Iran each month offers a chilling look at the surge in capital punishment there. The Hengaw Organization for Human Rights has documented at least 100 executions in Iran over the past month, indicating a stark increase of more than 50% in comparison to the previous month. In a report released Saturday, Hengaw disclosed a notable surge of 56.5% in the number of executions during November, recording 122 compared to the 78 reported in October.

The chairperson of the House Committee on Dangerous Drugs is urging Congress anew to consider the reimposition of the death penalty, especially for drug-related offenses, after China executed 2 Filipinos for drug trafficking. 2 Filipinos convicted of drug trafficking in China were executed in November, 10 years after their arrest, the Department of Foreign Affairs disclosed on Dec. 2. In a statement on Monday, Surigao del Norte Rep. Robert Ace Barbers said that the country is extending "kid's gloves treatment if not VIP treatment" to foreigners, especially Chinese nationals, arrested and convicted for drug trafficking in the Philippines.

Oklahoma executed Phillip Hancock on November 30 , 2023, following Governor Kevin Stitt’s rejection of the Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board’s recommendation that his sentence be commuted to life without parole. The governor’s indecision left Mr. Hancock waiting anxiously right up to the time of his scheduled execution when the governor’s office told the prison warden to proceed.  Mr. Hancock is the 123rd person executed in Oklahoma since the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976. His execution is also the fourth execution in Oklahoma this year and the final execution of 2023.

Last Friday, the Death Penalty Information Center issued its year-end report . The message is mixed. The report offered evidence of the substantial progress achieved by abolitionists during 2023 in their fight to end capital punishment in the United States. At the same time, it presented a bleak assessment of the Supreme Court’s current attitude toward the death penalty and documented the Court’s unwillingness to ensure fairness in capital cases.

Innocence cases dominated much of the media’s attention on death penalty cases in 2023. While these prisoners were largely unsuccessful in the courts, there was unprecedented support for their claims from state legislators, prosecutors, judges, and other elected officials, some of whom declared themselves newly disillusioned with use of the death penalty in their state. 

Against a backdrop of high-profile innocence cases and the U.S. Supreme Court’s seeming indifference to them, the 2023 Gallup poll found that more Americans now believe that the death penalty is administered unfairly than fairly.   Use of the death penalty remained geographically isolated, with only five states carrying out executions and only seven imposing death sentences.  For the ninth consecutive year, fewer than 30 people were executed and fewer than 50 were sentenced to death. These findings headline DPIC’s 2023 Year End Report , released on December 1.

Authorities renewed a reminder to Filipinos flying out to be vigilant against drug syndicates and refuse to carry any uninspected package from other people China has executed two Filipinos for drug trafficking despite high-level Philippine government appeals to commute their death sentences to life in prison, the Philippine government said on Saturday. The Department of Foreign Affairs in Manila did not identify the two Filipinos, citing the wishes of their families for privacy. It added that it did not announce the November 24 executions until the Philippine government was formally notified by China.

According to data analyzed by the DPIC, 79% of the death row inmates executed in 2023 had some disability or impairment, including serious mental illness, brain injury, developmental brain damage, or an IQ in the range considered intellectually disabled; and/or chronic serious childhood trauma, neglect and/or abuse. The report adds: "One-third or eight of the people executed had all three. At least three prisoners were under the age of 20 at the time of their crimes." Phillip Hancock on Thursday became the fourth death row inmate executed in Oklahoma this year. The state's parole board had voted 3-2 to recommend clemency for Hancock, who was convicted for the 2001 murders of two men, but the governor declined to intervene.

The Florida governor approved the executions of six people this year, and the state imposed five new death sentences. Florida governor and 2024 presidential candidate Ron DeSantis made a return to capital punishment in his state a key element of his "tough on crime" campaign messaging this past year, and the result was an overall increase in the use of the death penalty in the United States, according to a new annual report.

Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO); November 30, 2023: A November 2019 protester named Kamran Rezaei has been executed in Shiraz Central Prison. In the last week, a “Woman, Life, Freedom” protester, a Kurdish political prisoner and a 1980s political prisoner were executed in Iran. Condemning Kamran Rezaei’s execution, Iran Human Rights warns of more protester and political prisoner executions.

Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO); December 1, 2023: Newly obtained information shows that two of the men executed with Ayoub Karimi in Ghezelhesar Prison on Wednesday were sentenced to death for drug-related charges and the other four were on death row for murder. This is the fifth group execution in Ghezelhesar Prison in November. According to information obtained by Iran Human Rights, seven men were executed in Ghezelhesar Prison on 29 November. One of the men was previously identified as Kurdish political prisoner Ayoub Karimi who was sentenced to death for moharebeh (enmity against god) and efsad-fil-arz (corruption on earth) charges.

Execution went ahead despite Board of Pardon and Parole granting clemency to the condemned A 59-year-old man was executed in the US state of Oklahoma on Thursday for a double murder that he claimed was committed in self-defense. Phillip Hancock was put to death by lethal injection at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester, a spokeswoman for the Oklahoma Department of Corrections said.

Since its advent more than 40 years ago, lethal injection has become by far the most common method of enacting capital punishment in the United States, accounting for the vast majority of executions since the penalty was reinstated in 1976. The US government and 27 states reserve the death penalty for those deemed the worst of the worst. Convicted of particularly heinous crimes, inmates are typically put to death after their appeals run out, often a yearslong process that regularly reaches the US Supreme Court – which has found lethal injection constitutional and not a violation of Eighth Amendment protections against cruel and unusual punishment.

Elwood Hubert Jones was scheduled to be executed at 10 am local time, on Wednesday, December 6, 2023. His execution date has been vacated pending retrial. 71-year-old Elwood was convicted of murdering 67-year-old Rhoda Nathan in the Embassy Suites Hotel in Blue Ash, Ohio. Elwood spent 26 years on Ohio’s death row before being released on bond, pending a new trial.