Singapore | Prolific lawyer M Ravi, known for drug death-penalty cases, found dead

Ravi Madasamy, a high-profile lawyer who represented death-row inmates and campaigned against capital punishment, was found dead in the early hours, prompting a police investigation into an unnatural death

KUALA LUMPUR — Prolific Singapore lawyer Ravi Madasamy who tried to save Malaysian drug traffickers from the gallows found dead in the early hours with police investigating a case of unnatural death.

Lawyer Eugene Thuraisingam, who had previously represented 56-year-old Ravi in court and described him as a friend, said he was deeply saddened by the news.

“He has had his struggles but was always true to the cause he fought with all his heart. The cases he argued have helped shape constitutional law in Singapore.

“He has contributed to and will be missed by the legal profession,” Thuraisingam said.

He was fearless in his advocacy and would often push the envelope.

Lawyer Shashi Nathan also paid tribute to Ravi, describing him as a man who had contributed significantly to the law.

“Ravi was often divisive and went against the grain. But deep down I always sensed he had a good heart and wanted the best for his clients.

“He was fearless in his advocacy and would often push the envelope,” he was quoted saying by The Straits Times.

Ravi had spoken openly about his difficult upbringing. He told reporters in 2005 that his father, who died in 2003, was an alcoholic who was frequently in and out of jail.

His mother, a construction labourer who supported the family, died in 2000 at the age of 59.

One of seven siblings, Ravi studied law in Britain after graduating from the National University of Singapore with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1993. He began practising law in 1997.

Ravi was involved in several high-profile criminal cases. In 2020, he successfully helped overturn a decision that had reinstated the death penalty for his client, Malaysian national Gobi Avedian.

Gobi had been charged with importing 40.22g of heroin after being caught at Woodlands Checkpoint on Dec 11, 2014. He was initially sentenced in 2017 to 15 years’ jail and 10 strokes of the cane.

While the prosecution later succeeded on appeal, putting Gobi back on death row, Ravi filed a review application that resulted in the death sentence being set aside and the original sentence reinstated.

He is also widely known for his activism and constitutional challenges, particularly his opposition to Section 377A of Singapore’s Penal Code, which criminalised sex between men.

In 2020, he argued that it was “absurd and arbitrary” for the law to remain on the statute books given the Government’s policy of non-enforcement in respect of consensual homosexual acts in private. Section 377A was repealed by Parliament in 2022.

Despite his legal contributions, Ravi remained a controversial figure within the legal fraternity.

Diagnosed with bipolar disorder in 2006, he was no stranger to disciplinary proceedings, with past findings citing improper conduct ranging from disruptive courtroom behaviour to the improper handling of clients.

Over the past two decades, he faced sanctions including fines and suspensions, and was eventually struck off the rolls by the Court of Three Judges in two separate matters.

One involved “false and unwarranted attacks” made on Facebook in August 2020 against then President Halimah Yacob, then Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and former prime minister Goh Chok Tong.

In another case, he was found to have repeatedly interrupted a High Court judge in November 2021 while representing a former SBS Transit bus driver, accusing the judge of bias and falsely claiming his client wished to withdraw the suit.

Investigations later revealed that a paralegal from Ravi’s firm had written to the court stating the client wanted him to continue acting, despite having discharged him.

At the time of his death, Ravi was serving a five-year suspension — the maximum allowed under the law for making what the court described as “baseless and grave” allegations against the Attorney-General’s Chambers and the Law Society, arising from comments made to socio-political website The Online Citizen and posts on Facebook in 2020.

Ravi also had a long association with politics and contested the 2015 General Election under the Reform Party banner.

He ran in Ang Mo Kio GRC against Senior Minister Lee Hsien Loong, securing 21.36 per cent of the vote.

R.I.P — DPN

Source: scoop.my, T. Vignesh, December 24, 2025

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

— Oscar Wilde

Comments

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.

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.

Alabama | Judge bars nitrogen gas execution, says method is unconstitutionally cruel

MONTGOMERY, Ala. -- A federal judge on Tuesday permanently blocked Alabama from executing an inmate with nitrogen gas after declaring it violates the ban on cruel and unusual punishment. U.S. District Judge Emily Marks issued the ruling hours after an appeals court reversed her initial finding that the method was constitutional. Marks permanently enjoined the state from executing Jeffrey Lee, 49, by nitrogen gas. He was scheduled to be executed Thursday. The decision, for now, blocks the use of the controversial new execution method that the state has championed since 2024, but the issue will likely end up before the U.S. Supreme Court.

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...

Texas | Death Row Inmate Gets Resentenced to Life

Harris County district judge recommends compassionate release for Clarence Jordan A 1977 convenience store robbery that resulted in a clerk’s death landed Clarence Jordan on Texas Death Row, where he remained for decades even though he was declared incompetent for execution. On Monday, a judge recommended that the disabled man be released. Harris County District Court Judge Katherine Thomas resentenced Jordan to life with the possibility of parole and suggested that he be considered for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice’s Medically Recommended Intensive Supervision program, also known as compassionate release.

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.

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.

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.

Alabama | Judicial Decision About Nitrogen Hypoxia Renders the Constitutional Prohibition of Cruel Punishment Meaningless

On June 11, the state of Alabama plans to execute Jeffrey Lee with nitrogen hypoxia . He will be the ninth person put to death by this method since its first use in 2024. Lee contends that nitrogen hypoxia will cause him great suffering. On May 28, Federal District Judge Emily Marks agreed with him but said his execution could proceed nonetheless. Hers is a remarkable and shockingly candid decision. It made history, coming after the first trial in the country on the constitutionality of nitrogen hypoxia. To her credit, Judge Marks offered an unusually detailed picture of the pain imposed by capital punishment.

Death Penalty News

Search This Blog