Death Penalty News

Manuel Guerrero Aviña, a dual British-Mexican citizen, has been arrested in Qatar after falling victim to a police-led Grindr sting. The former British Airways manager was detained on 4 February 2024 after replying to a fake message on the app. Gay sex in the conservative Muslim country is punishable by up to seven years in prison, and carries the death penalty under Sharia law, although this is unenforced.

The Taliban raped and beat a gay man after duping him into meeting them, a report from ITV says. The outlet said that Hanan, a pseudonym given to protect his identity, had been speaking to a man on social media who promised to help him find a safe way out of Afghanistan. Many LGBTQ people have been desperately trying to flee the country following the Taliban takeover. Hanan agreed to meet the man in Kabul after speaking for three weeks online, who unbeknownst to him were actually Taliban men. When Hanan met the men, they raped and beat him, Afghan LGBTQ rights activist Artemis Akbary told ITV. Akbary told the outlet that Taliban fighters are likely to do this again. "They'll make a profile account and deceive LGBT+ people by pretending they're a member of the community," he said. "Executed for being gay" Insider recently spoke to men from Afghanistan's secret gay community, who said they are living through a "nightmare" and in fear of their fut...

He admitted to attacking "dozens" of gay men before he ended up murdering someone. A Michigan man is being prosecuted for the murder of a gay man and the shooting another in what prosecutors say was an anti-gay attack. Demetris Nelson has been charged with first degree murder, felony murder, attempted murder, and assault with intent to rob in the murder of a gay man in Detroit last week. Prosecutors believe that Nelson, 26, met up with Brian Anderson, 31, and Malcolm Drake, 26, on July 6 at 4 a.m. after they connected through Grindr. Nelson allegedly got into the back of their car, pulled out a gun, and told them he was robbing them. He shot both of them, killing Anderson. Drake was shot in the head but survived. Michigan’s hate crimes law only protects people targeted for their race, color, religion, gender, or national origin. “To some, this will be just another hateful and violent act in America. They will read about this case and continue to...

Brunei is introducing strict new Islamic laws that make sex between men an offence punishable by stoning to death. The new measures, that come into force on Wednesday, also cover a range of other crimes including punishment for theft by amputation. The move has sparked international condemnation. The sultan of the small south-east Asian nation on Wednesday called for "stronger" Islamic teachings. "I want to see Islamic teachings in this country grow stronger," Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah said at a public address, according to AFP news agency, without mentioning the new laws. Brunei's gay community has expressed shock and fear at the "medieval punishments". "You wake up and realise that your neighbours, your family or even that nice old lady that sells prawn fritters by the side of the road doesn't think you're human, or is okay with stoning," one Bruneian gay man, who did not want to be identified, told the BBC....

PFLUGERVILLE — Several years before embarking on a bombing spree that terrorized Austin, Mark Conditt had turned against his family’s devout Christianity and declared himself an atheist. It was the first of many steps that separated the 23-year-old from his oldest friends and set him on a course of increasing isolation. He lost his job in the tech industry less than a year before the bombings. Investigators have struggled for weeks to find a single confidant who could provide a window into his life. His roommates told authorities Conditt kept his bedroom door locked and dodged questions about why. During the race to stop the attacks and in the weeks after, investigators also obtained information indicating that Conditt was questioning his sexuality. As a 17-year-old, he had written that homosexuality is “not natural,” echoing the teachings of his religious education, and raising the prospect of inner turmoil in his final months. On the day Conditt killed himself with...

A 23-year-old suspected of planting the deadly bombs that terrorised Austin for three weeks was described yesterday by his uncle as a smart and kind “computer geek” and a friend said he was an assertive person who would end up being “kind of dominant and intimidating in conversation”. Neither had any idea what motivated Mark Anthony Conditt, who authorities say died after detonating a bomb in his ute as officers moved in to arrest him near Austin. The attacks in the Texas capital and suburban San Antonio killed two people and wounded four others. “I mean, this is coming from nowhere. We just don’t know what. I don’t know how many ways to say it but everyone is caught off guard by this,” said Conditt’s uncle, Mike Courtney of Lakewood, Colorado. Austin Police Chief Brian Manley said he considered a 25-minute recording on mobile phone found with Conditt a “confession”. On the recording, Conditt describes seven explosive devices, and “we have accounted for the devices t...

Egypt’s authorities are deliberately fuelling a homophobic ‘moral panic’ in order to build support for a homophobic crackdown, a report has alleged. There has recently been a dramatic surge in arrests of gay people in Egypt , fuelled in part by the country’s media.

Altogether, more than 180 alleged homosexuals have been arrested in the three largely Muslim countries. The U.N. has issued a stern rebuke against the recent harassment and arrests of LGBT people in three largely Muslim countries. “We are deeply concerned by a wave of arrests in Azerbaijan, Egypt and Indonesia of more than 180 people perceived to be [LGBT],” said U.N. human rights spokesperson Rupert Colville. “Arresting or detaining people based on their actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity is by definition arbitrary and violates international law.” In Azerbaijan, U.N. experts reported, some 80 people thought to be gay or transgender have been arrested in the past month.  Some reportedly have been subjected to beatings and electric shocks, with the heads of trans women forcibly shaved. In Egypt, where a conviction on sodomy charges can land you in prison for up to six years, seven people were arrested after rainbow flags flew at a Ca...