Indonesia: AGO OK's execution of 5 death row inmates

The Attorney General's Office has issued execution orders for 5 prisoners, but no date has been set for the firing squads, pending final appeals, an official says.

Raheem Agbaje Salami, who was sentenced to death for drug smuggling, is currently incarcerated at the Madiun detention center, East Java. He was caught transporting 5 kilograms of heroin into Indonesia in early 1999.

He was initially sentenced to life imprisonment by the Surabaya District Court in April 1999, but the Supreme Court imposed the death penalty in November 1999.

"Raheem later submitted an appeal for a review after the Supreme Court handed down a harsher sentence than the Surabaya District Court. He is still waiting for a decision on the appeal he submitted on Dec. 13, 2003," East Java Prosecutor's Office representative told The Jakarta Post on Friday.

The East Java High Court had issued an even-lighter penalty and had sentenced him to 20 years in prison and fined him Rp 100 million (US$11,000). The other 4 death row convicts are Hangky Gunawan, Sugianto, Aris Setyawan and Nur Hasan Yogi Mahendra

Eddy said his office had received execution orders for the 5 convicts from the deputy attorney general for general crimes but had yet to set a date for the executions.

"We have yet to schedule the executions because we still have to consider a number of things before carrying out the executions, such as filing for appeals at the Supreme Court and submitting petitions for clemency to President Soesilo Bambang Yudhoyono," Eddy said.

Hangky was arrested in May 2006 for operating an ecstasy drug laboratory in an upscale housing complex in Surabaya.

"In late 2007, the Supreme Court sentenced Hangky to death. He was sentenced by the East Java High Court to 18 years in prison. He is currently serving his term at the Porong penitentiary and filed an appeal in 2007," Eddy said.

Sugianto, a pedicab driver, was sentenced to death in 1995 for murdering a family of 4, including 2 children. He buried the victims in a hole which he then sealed in cement. Incarcerated at the Porong penitentiary, he sought clemency from the president in October 2007.

"The 2 other death row convicts are Aris Setyawan, who was sentenced to death for murdering 4 friends in 1997 and Nur Hasan Yogi Mahendra, for a series of murders in 2005. The pair are serving their sentences at the Lamongan prison and filed for clemency in 2006," said Eddy.

Capital punishment in Indonesia is regulated by Law No. 2/1964, which stipulates that death sentences should be carried out by firing squad.

Source: Jakarta Post, July 26, 2010

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