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U.S. Presidential Election 2024: Death penalty absent from campaign, but not from minds

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Kamala Harris, once openly opposed to the death penalty despite political costs, now avoids the topic as a candidate. Meanwhile, Donald Trump advocates tougher criminal policies, though presidential authority in this area is limited. A few blocks from downtown Richmond, Virginia, the intersection of Spring Street and Belvidere Street now presents a completely different view. Where once stood a grim, old brick building, there is now a modern building with a glass facade reflecting the sun shining on Virginia’s capital. Trees along the wide Belvidere Street give the neighborhood a promenade-like feel, with the James River flowing nearby along the memorial for American war dead.

Family of Kenyan on Saudi death row in new donations call

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The family of Steve Munyakho, a Kenyan migrant in a Saudi Arabian prison has renewed appeal for donations to help pay the Sh150 million court fine to secure his release.

Munyakho has been a jailbird, languishing in several prisons in the Arab country for the last thirteen years after he was convicted of killing his workmate where he is currently incarcerated at Shimeisi Prison in Makkah region.

In early 2011, the father of three is claimed to have engaged in a fight at his place of work with a fellow migrant Abdul Halim Mujahid Makrad Saleh from Yemen who later succumbed to injuries in a hospital in Saudi Arabia’s capital Riyadh.

The victim’s family appealed the verdict in a Shariah Court, and in June 2014, the initial sentence was revised to the death penalty during the appeal case that lasted for two years and eight months.

The family was also given an option of paying Sh400 million as blood money to the Saleh’s family but it negotiated the amount to Sh150 million to save Munyakho from execution.

Saudi authorities had warned Munyakho would be executed if the family did not raise the money and set May 15 as the deadline.

Through Kenya government intervention, the deadline has been moved to November 20.

Currently, the family has managed to raise Sh11 million out of which they have sent to Saudi Sh8 million.

“This is an enormous amount and  it’s definitely out of reach for our colleague Dorothy Musopole (Munyakho’s mother) and her  family who are also humble means,” ‘Bring Back Stevo’ committee chairman and veteran editor Joseph Odindo said. With the government having informed them that there is no money to bail their kin out, the family has once again urged Kenyans to support them to raise the balance before the November deadline.

Source: peopledaily.digital, Staff, July 25, 2024

_____________________________________________________________________








"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: Saudi Arabia
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