Death Penalty News

JAKARTA, Aug 1 — A Malaysian pilot could face the death penalty after being charged with smuggling more than 70,000 ecstasy pills into Indonesia. The 39-year-old man, identified only by the initials MSO, was detained on Wednesday at Soekarno-Hatta International Airport shortly after arriving from Kuala Lumpur. Customs officers found 14 packages containing more than 70,000 ecstasy pills in his luggage, as well as four grammes of methamphetamine (meth), believed to be for personal use, in his wallet.

A man in Indonesia has been arrested for allegedly murdering his mother-in-law using satay laced with rat poison.  Police say Purwadi Wahyudi ordered chicken skewers on 18 May, dipped them in toxic chemicals, then couriered them to the alleged victim's house because he felt disrespected by her.  He tried to frame his sister-in-law, who discovered the 57-year-old woman's body, covered in vomit, at her home in Central Java the next day, detectives added.

Indonesian authorities have arrested two Russian nationals for allegedly smuggling narcotics into Bali following a dramatic high-speed car chase at the popular tourist destination. A 52-year-old woman and a 40-year-old man were arrested on Friday for allegedly trying to smuggle 7.8kg of hashish in a suitcase from Thailand, said Indonesia's national narcotics agency on Sunday. "We secured evidence in the form of hashish weighing 7.8kg gross weight, along with passports, mobile phones, and one four-wheeled vehicle,” said narcotics agency chief Komjen Pol Suyudi Ario Seto.

An Australian woman has been arrested in Indonesia for allegedly receiving a delivery of cannabis-infused vape liquid. Indonesian police have arrested an Australian woman allegedly found with 59 millilitres of vape liquid containing cannabis that she said was for pain relief but can land her in prison. The woman, 53, risks 20 years behind bars under Indonesia's no-exceptions anti-drug laws, narcotics officer I Nyoman Diana Mahardika told AFP on Thursday. The unnamed woman was arrested last month at her rented house on the resort island of Lombok after police found out she had allegedly received a delivery of liquid cannabis.

Amnesty International says Indonesia continues to impose large numbers of death sentences despite a decade-long halt in executions, warning proposed execution regulations risk undermining human rights protections. Amnesty International has warned that Indonesia remains a significant contributor of new death sentences globally despite not carrying out executions for nearly a decade. In its latest report, Death Sentences and Executions 2025 , released on Wednesday, Amnesty International said Indonesian courts handed down at least 68 death sentences during 2025, most of them linked to drug-related offences.

Ani Anggraeni spent nearly 15 years in prison for drug trafficking before her death sentence was commuted and she was later pardoned An Indonesian woman who spent nearly 15 years on death row in a Malaysian prison for drug trafficking has returned home after receiving clemency, in a case rights groups say highlights the exploitation of poor migrant women in cross-border drug operations. Ani Anggraeni, also known as Asih, boarded a flight from Kuala Lumpur to Jakarta late on Thursday after being freed from custody.

DENPASAR – Two British men were given lengthy jail terms on Feb 26 by an Indonesian court after being found guilty of smuggling cocaine into the popular holiday island of Bali. Kial Garth Robinson was sentenced to 11 years, while Piran Ezra Wilkinson landed a term of nine years. Both were also ordered to pay a fine of around US$60,000 (S$75,804) or serve an additional 190 days. Robinson, 29, was arrested in September 2025 at Ngurah Rai International Airport after an officer found two packages containing 1.3kg of cocaine in his backpack.

Police observer Poengky Indarti has called for strict criminal sanctions against police personnel involved in drug cases to create a deterrent effect and prevent similar misconduct by other officers.  “The imposition of severe criminal penalties, including the death penalty and life imprisonment, is expected to provide a shock therapy,” she said in Jakarta on Tuesday.  According to Poengky, law enforcement should also apply multiple charges so that perpetrators are not only sentenced to prison terms but also financially impoverished. 

Indonesian prosecutors are seeking the death penalty for six defendants accused of smuggling nearly two tonnes of methamphetamine in Riau Islands waters, saying they knowingly transported the drugs aboard a vessel intercepted at sea.  Attorney General’s Office spokesperson Anang Supriatna said the suspects admitted receiving about 67 packages, weighing nearly two tonnes, in a mid-sea transfer.  “They were aware they received around 67 packages, or about 2 tonnes of meth, at sea,” Anang told reporters in Jakarta on Friday. 

Countries across Southeast Asia are moving away from the use of capital punishment. But Singapore remains an outlier. From Vietnam to Malaysia and Indonesia, Southeast Asian governments are narrowing the use of the death penalty and edging, often cautiously, toward abolition.  At present, eight of the 11 Southeast Asian countries retain the death penalty. Only Cambodia, the Philippines and Timor-Leste have abolished it in law. But recent years have seen most of the retentionist states abide by de facto moratoriums on executions and pass new legislation so death is no longer the mandatory punishment for certain crimes.

Officials described in silence the day Mary Jane Veloso returned to Philippine custody in December 2024 after spending over fifteen years overseas. However, many Filipinos found it emotionally charged, particularly those who had family members employed abroad. Not only did someone return, but the topic we’ve been trying to answer—what happens when the system fails the weakest?—also came back into focus. She had departed the nation in 2010 with common aspirations: modest but determined. To provide for her family, she sought domestic work overseas, just like a startlingly high percentage of Filipina workers. What happened next was a destructive spiral. Mary Jane, who was arrested in Indonesia after more than two kilograms of heroin were discovered in her suitcase, said she had no idea what she was carrying.

JAKARTA, Indonesia -- JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — Indonesia on Friday began enforcing its newly ratified penal code, replacing a Dutch-era criminal law that had governed the country for more than 80 years and marking a major shift in its legal landscape. Since proclaiming independence in 1945, the Southeast Asian country had continued to operate under a colonial framework widely criticized as outdated and misaligned with Indonesia’s social values. Efforts to revise the code stalled for decades as lawmakers debated how to balance human rights, religious norms and local traditions in the world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation.

A trio of British drug mules who tried to smuggle £300,000 (US$405,000, €345,000) worth of cocaine into Bali are reportedly set to be deported back to the UK after missing out on the death penalty. Lisa Stocker, 39, a mother-of-three, was arrested with her partner Jonathan Collyer, 39, back in February. She was stopped after a routine X-ray of their luggage detected 17 packets of the dessert Angel Delight that had been stuffed with nearly a kilogram of cocaine. 

Indonesia and the Netherlands have agreed to repatriate two Dutch nationals convicted on drug offenses in Indonesia Indonesia and the Netherlands on Tuesday agreed to repatriate two Dutch nationals convicted on drug offences in Indonesia, including one facing the death penalty and another serving a life sentence. The agreement was signed by officials in both Jakarta and Amsterdam following a request by the Dutch king and foreign ministry for the release of the men, both of whom are in poor health, according to Indonesia’s senior law minister, Yusril Ihza Mahendra.

Two British drug convicts, including a grandmother who had been on death row in Indonesia for more than a decade, arrived back in the UK on Friday. Indonesia has some of the world's toughest drug laws, but has moved to release more than half a dozen high-profile detainees in the last year. Lindsay Sandiford, 69, was sentenced to death on the tourist island of Bali in 2013 for smuggling $2.14 million worth of cocaine into Indonesia. She was released on humanitarian grounds along with Shahab Shahabadi, 36, who had been serving a life sentence for drug offences after his arrest in 2014.

Lindsay Sandiford, 69, will be handed a UK-funded seat on a flight leaving Bali this afternoon. She was sentenced to death in 2013 after being caught smuggling £1.6million of cocaine into Indonesia. The 69-year-old pensioner has been granted a UK-funded seat on a flight leaving Bali this afternoon. The legal secretary, who was sentenced to death in 2013, will have a brief layover before landing at London Heathrow Airport following a 20-hour journey. This marks the end of a distressing period for Sandiford, during which she spent 13 years awaiting execution for smuggling £1.6million worth of cocaine into Indonesia.

Denpasar (Indonesia) (AFP) – The trial of three Australians accused of plotting the murder of a compatriot at a villa on the Indonesian resort island of Bali began Thursday, with all facing the death penalty. Prosecutors read out charges of premeditated murder for Darcy Jenson, 37, Paea-I-Middlemore Tupou, 37, and Coskun Mevlut, 23, over the shooting of 32-year-old Australian national Zivan Radmanovic in June. He was killed when two people burst into his villa in the tourist hub of Badung and at least one opened fire.

The decision comes amid the revelation that actor Ammar Zoni, currently serving a four-year sentence at Salemba Penitentiary in Central Jakarta for narcotics-related charges, was allegedly involved in drug trafficking inside the facility, along with five other inmates. JAKARTA – More than 1,000 prison guards are undergoing retraining at the maximum-security prisons on Nusakambangan Island, following a string of scandals involving criminal activities orchestrated from behind bars, a senior minister has said. Coordinating Minister for Law, Human Rights, Immigration and Correctional Services Yusril Ihza Mahendra said the retraining program was intended to reinforce discipline among correctional officers and improve their oversight of inmates, particularly to curb the widespread circulation of narcotics within penitentiaries across the country.

When Malaysia, through a deputy minister, allegedly said it was “useless” (or “of no operational value”) to keep a Malaysian at risk of being executed in Singapore , it was totally unjust, wrong and contrary to Malaysia’s own position of a moratorium on executions, pending the abolition of the death the penalty, and the obligation to act against the crime of drug trafficking , and, most importantly, Malaysia’s duty to protect the lives of Malaysians. Worse, the minister revealed that no investigation papers were opened and the matter was not even referred to the public prosecutor. It is the public prosecutor who should have decided whether it was important to keep such a possible material witness alive or not and whether to commence investigations on those whose names were provided by Pannir Selvam Pranthaman.

The British national, 69, could be free to return home following an agreement between Indonesia and the UK A British grandmother who was facing a death sentence in Bali for smuggling a large haul of cocaine into the island will be freed, more than a decade after her arrest. Lindsay Sandiford, 69, is currently being held in the notorious Kerobokan prison, which holds around 1,000 inmates. Sandiford, from Redcar in Teesside, could be free to return home as soon as Tuesday after an Indonesian government source told AFP that an agreement had been reached with the UK government.