Indonesia: Drug Convict Moved to Nusakambangan Island Ahead of Executions

Jakarta. Convicted drug smuggler Merry Utami was moved from the Tangerang Women's Prison in Banten to Nusakambangan Island in Cilacap, Central Java, on Sunday morning (24/07), pointing to the likelihood that her execution may be imminent.

"According to reports I received, she was moved to an isolation cell at Besi Prison on Nusakambangan Island for some introduction," said Abdul Aris, coordinator for prisons in the Cilacap area, as reported by Antara news agency.

He was unable to explain, however, why the death-row inmate was moved to the notorious prison island, where executions are routinely carried out.

Merry was transported from Tangerang at around 4.30 a.m., escorted by members of the Police Mobile Brigade (Brimob).

The Tangerang District Court sentenced Merry to death in 2003 after she was arrested with 1.1 kilograms of heroin at Soekarno-Hatta International Airport outside Jakarta.

It has been an open secret that death-row inmates are moved to Nusakambangan Island to be held in isolation at Besi Prison before execution. After they arrive, inmates usually receive guidance from religious leaders for a few days while the government fulfils their last wishes before executing them by firing squad.

The Indonesian government plans to execute 18 drug convicts this year, and 30 more in 2017, Attorney General H.M. Prasetyo said last month. The third round of executions is scheduled to take place on the island, but Prasetyo has yet to announce the exact date.

Indonesia executed 14 convicts last year, including citizens of Australia, Brazil, the Netherlands and Nigeria, despite repeated pleas for mercy from foreign governments, international organizations and activists.

Only Mary Jane Veloso of the Philippines received a last-minute reprieve last year, following a request from Manila after an employment recruiter, whom Veloso had accused of planting drugs in her luggage, gave herself up to police. Veloso will not be included in this year's executions.

Source: Jakarta Globe, July 24, 2016

Death-row convict Merri Utami isolated in special cell in Nusakambangan

Merri Utami, a death-row drug convict, has been moved to Nusakambangan prison island in Cilacap, Central Java, as the next round of executions draws nearer.

Merri, from Sukoharjo, Central Java, had been serving her sentence at the Tangerang Women’s Penitentiary in Banten since 2004 before she was moved to Nusakambangan under tight escort at 4:30 a.m. local time on Sunday. Merri was sentenced to death for carrying 1.1 kilograms of heroin at Soekarno-Hatta International Airport in 2003.

The transfer of Merry to Nusakambangan indicates that the third round of executions of drug convicts on the prison island will be carried out in the near future. The transfer was carried out not long after the Supreme Court rejected a second case review request filed by death-row convict Freddy Budiman on Friday.

“I’ve received a report that Merri Utami has been transferred to Nusakambangan and placed in a special room. It’s probable that the executions will be conducted next week but for an exact schedule, please ask the Attorney General’s Office. Technically, Nusakambangan is ready for the executions,” head of the correctional division facility at the Central Java office of the Law and Human Rights Ministry, Molyanto, told The Jakarta Post on Sunday.

Merri has been placed in an isolation cell at the Besi Prison. She is now the only female inmate at Nusakambangan, where around 1,000 high-security convicts, 50 of whom are on death row, are serving their sentences.

Attorney General HM Prasetyo had previously stated that the execution of several drug convicts would take place after Idul Fitri but the exact date of the executions remains unknown. In January 2015, six death-row inmates were executed in Nusakambangan, followed by eight more three months later.

Source: The Jakarta Post, Agus Maryono, July 25, 2016

⚑ | Report an error, an omission; suggest a story or a new angle to an existing story; send a submission; recommend a resource; contact the webmaster, contact us: deathpenaltynews@gmail.com.

Opposed to Capital Punishment? Help us keep this blog up and running!

"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed, but by the punishments that the good have inflicted." - Oscar Wilde

US | Army lays groundwork for death row executions if Trump gives approval

The Army is preparing to carry out the executions of the military's four death-row inmates if ordered to do so by the president, according to an internal planning document reviewed by ABC News. If carried out, it would mark the first time the military executed convicted American inmates in more than a half-century The plan, dubbed "Operation Resolute Justice" and issued internally in February, directs Army officials to coordinate with the Federal Bureau of Prisons to transfer condemned prisoners from the U.S. Disciplinary Barracks at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, to the federal execution facility in Terre Haute, Indiana, where the Justice Department carried out a series of non-military federal executions during President Donald Trump's first term.

Oklahoma | Richard Glossip on Life After Decades on Death Row

In an exclusive interview at home in Oklahoma City, Glossip describes his first days of freedom in a world he hasn’t experienced for nearly 30 years. For three decades, Richard Glossip lived on concrete. First at the Oklahoma County jail, after his arrest for murder in 1997, and then in the underground bunker housing death row inmates at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary. As with the rest of his surroundings, he eventually got used to the hard, unforgiving floors, although recently he’d developed painful swelling in his legs.

Alabama Plans to Execute Jeffrey Lee Despite Jury Vote for Life

Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey has scheduled the execution of Jeffrey Lee by nitrogen suffocation for June 11, 2026, even though his capital jury voted 7-5 against the death penalty and chose a sentence of life imprisonment without parole. The trial judge overrode the jury’s verdict and sentenced Mr. Lee to death in 2000, relying on a unique Alabama practice that allowed judges to overrule jury verdicts in death penalty cases. Alabama is the only state where judges overrode jury verdicts of life to impose the death penalty routinely—in more than 100 cases since 1976. As a result, nearly 20% of the people currently on Alabama’s death row were sentenced to death by elected judges even after their juries chose life imprisonment without parole.

20 Minutes to Death: Witness to the Last Execution in France

The following document is a firsthand account of the final moments of Hamida Djandoubi, a convicted murderer executed by guillotine at Marseille’s Baumettes Prison on September 10, 1977. The record—dated September 9—was written by Monique Mabelly, a judge appointed by the state to witness the proceedings. Djandoubi’s execution would ultimately be the last carried out in France before capital punishment was abolished in 1981. At the time, President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing—who had publicly voiced his "deep aversion to the death penalty" prior to his election—rejected Djandoubi’s appeal for clemency. Choosing to let "justice take its course," the President allowed the execution to proceed, just as he had in two previous cases during his term: Christian Ranucci , executed on July 28, 1976 and Jérôme Carrein , executed on June 23, 1977. Hamida Djandoubi , a Tunisian national, was sentenced to death for killing his former lover, Elisabeth Bousquet. He was execu...

New Mississippi billboard warns criminals: ‘Firing squad is legal’

DESOTO COUNTY, Miss. (WREG) — A billboard standing on Interstate 55 southbound as you cross the Tennessee state line and enter Mississippi from Memphis is sending a grim message to those coming into the state. DeSoto County District Attorney Matthew Barton recently announced the new billboard campaign, which features the sign reading, “WELCOME TO MISSISSIPPI. WHERE THE FIRING SQUAD IS LEGAL. THINK TWICE.” It references Mississippi’s law permitting execution by firing squad under certain circumstances for inmates sentenced to death. Barton says this campaign is aimed at deterring violent crime and sends a direct message to criminals entering Mississippi.

Florida executes Andrew Richard Lukehart

Jacksonville man who killed his girlfriend’s 5-month-old baby in 1996 executed 30 years later A Jacksonville man who confessed to killing his girlfriend’s 5-month-old daughter and throwing her body in a pond 3 decades ago was executed on Tuesday evening. Andrew Richard Lukehart, 53, was scheduled to receive a 3-drug injection starting at 6 p.m. at Florida State Prison near Starke. He was sentenced to death after being convicted of aggravated child abuse and felony murder in the death of Gabrielle Hanshaw. The baby’s mother told News4JAX she plans to attend the execution.

Texas | Tanner Horner now incarcerated at the Polunsky Unit

Convicted child killer Tanner Horner has now taken up residence in one of the most brutal death row prisons after being sentenced to die by a Texas jury last month. Horner is incarcerated at the Polunsky Unit, an infamously restrictive prison outside Houston where the state's death row inmates are housed in an all-solitary confinement wing and spend at least 22 hours a day in their 60-square-foot cells. The former FedEx deliveryman, 34, was booked at the notorious prison on May 5 within hours of being sentenced for the gruesome murder of Athena Strand, 7, whom he admitted strangling while delivering a Christmas gift to her home in November 2022.

Can the state execute a man who already survived? | Opinion

A second execution would be an unimaginable nightmare for Tony Carruthers and a moral horror for the rest of us. Tony Carruthers is not supposed to be alive . On May 21, Tennessee set out to execute him. It failed. Carruthers survived. He is not the first person to survive an execution in the United States, and he won’t be the last. For Carruthers, the question is: Now what? Will the state seek to arrange a second execution?

Florida | 2-time Jacksonville baby abuser is set for execution

Thirty years ago while on probation for fracturing an infant’s skull, Andrew Lukehart inflicted at least five blows to the head of another baby, then concocted a story that she was abducted before eventually leading authorities to her body in a swamp area. At 6 p.m. Tuesday, June 2, the 53-year-old from Jacksonville is set to become Florida’s eighth man on death row to be executed in 2026. He will become the 36th under Gov. Ron DeSantis after a record 19 inmates were executed by the state in 2025, including another from Duval County: Michael Bell.

Iran executes Esma Zarei in Ardabil Prison after she gave birth in custody

Hengaw – Saturday, May 23, 2026. Iranian authorities have executed Esma Zarei, a 28-year-old Turkish woman from Parsabad in Ardabil Province, who had previously been sentenced to death on charges of “premeditated murder” in connection with the killing of her husband. She is the sixth woman executed in Iran since the beginning of 2026. According to information received by Hengaw Organization for Human Rights, Zarei was executed at dawn on Wednesday, May 20, 2026, in Ardabil Central Prison. She had been sentenced to qisas (retribution-in-kind) after being convicted of her husband’s murder.

Death Penalty News

Search This Blog