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Arkansas Supreme Court Decision Allows New DNA Testing in Case of the ​“West Memphis Three,” Convicted of Killing Three Children in 1993

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On April 18, 2024, the Arkansas Supreme Court decided 4-3 to reverse a 2022 lower court decision and allow genetic testing of crime scene evidence from the 1993 killing of three eight-year-old boys in West Memphis. The three men convicted in 1994 for the killings were released in 2011 after taking an Alford plea, in which they maintained their innocence but plead guilty to the crime, in exchange for 18 years’ time served and 10 years of a suspended sentence. 

Pakistan | IHC releases 8 death row convicts

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8 men condemned to death by trial courts walked out free men after Islamabad High Court (IHC) decided their appeals during the lockdown period.

Limited to hearing cases of only urgent nature during the lockdown, the IHC decided at least 25 appeals, which were pending for the last 6 years.

The restrictions imposed to contain the Covid-19 proved to be a blessing for the 12 convicts, including 8 death row prisoners, who won their freedom in the review petitions which were otherwise pending in the IHC for over 6 years.

Different benches of the IHC court-approved 8 pleas filed by the convicts on death rows for hearing and ordered their acquittal, overruling the punishments awarded by the lower courts.

The report issued by the IHC registrar office on Tuesday stated that a 2-member bench headed by Chief Justice Athar Minallah adjudicated some 9 appeals while the bench headed by Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kiyani decided the fate of 5 petitioners.

The bench led by Justice Aamer Farooq heard over 2 appeals seeking suspension of their punishments whereas 3 single-member benches of IHC announced verdicts of 9 cases.

All the cases, pending for over the past 6 years, were heard between March 27 and April 23. The pleas had been filed by the convicts who had been awarded either long-term sentences including life sentence or death penalty by the lower courts over different offenses.

Of total 25 pleas that the benches presided over during the given duration, as many as 12 convicts who were awarded life sentence or sentences of different durations were released by the IHC.

2 such cases were referred back to the trial courts for retrial keeping in view all facts and figures. A convict of life imprisonment got his appeal rejected by the IHC.

Furthermore, a convict succeeded in getting his death penalty commuted to life imprisonment, while review petitions of 2 other death row prisoners were approved for hearing.

Source: The Express Tribune, Staff, May 6, 2020


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