3 Mexican brothers sentenced to death in Malaysia are preparing to file their last appeal before the Federal Court in Malaysia, which could hold the hearing before the end of the year, the defense said.
"The hearing will most probably take place before the end of the year, the Federal Court judges have to review a lot of documents pertaining to the case," Kitson Foong, the lawyer of Mexicans Luis Alfonso, Simon and Jose Regino Gonzalez Villarreal, told Efe.
According to Foong, the brothers are being held in jail in the state of Pahang, some 185 km northwest of Kuala Lumpur.
The Mexicans were arrested on March 4, 2008 in a police raid in the southern city of Johor along with a Malaysian and a Singaporean citizen who have also been given the death penalty.
All 5 were found in the vicinity of a ship where police agents seized 29 kilograms of methamphetamine valued at $15 million, 1/3 of which disappeared in police custody.
The Gonzalez Villarreal brothers, natives of the state of Sinaloa, claim that they were only employed to clean the place and that they were not aware of the consignment.
The Malaysian prosecutor, however, says that traces of drugs were found on their clothes and their hands.
In May 2012, the Kuala Lumpur High Court sentenced the Mexicans to death by hanging, a ruling that was upheld by the Court of Appeal a year later.
The Federal Court is the only court where those convicted can appeal.
Although Sinaloa is known to be home to one of the largest drug cartels, the Gonzalez Villarreal brothers have no criminal records and belong to a humble family of 7 siblings, the youngest of whom died in a robbery.
Mexico's government, which opposes the death penalty, has said that "it will use all the means at its disposal" to revoke the death sentence handed to the 3 Mexicans.
Source: Latin American Herald Tribune, August 27, 2014
