2 Executions To Be Carried Out In Singapore This Week
Two executions are reportedly set to take place in Singapore this week. This includes the country’s first execution of a woman in two decades.
Both of the prisoners were previously convicted of drug offences.
The first is a 56-year-old man. He was sentenced to death in 2018 after trafficking diamorphine, also known as heroin.
45-year-old Saridewi Djamani is the other prisoner facing the gallows. She was also sentenced to death in 2018 for trafficking diamorphine.
56-year-old Singaporean man sentenced to death in 2018 for trafficking diamorphine
Criminal justice reform group Transformative Justice Collective (TJC) shared in a Facebook post that they have confirmed two upcoming executions in Singapore.
They will be carried out on Wednesday (26 July) and Friday (28 July). Both the prisoners who are facing the gallows were previously convicted of drug offences.
Source: AP via The Standard HK, for illustration purposes only
The first is a 56-year-old man. He had previously been found guilty of trafficking around 50g of diamorphine.
He was sentenced to death in 2018.
According to the collective, he previously argued that most of his statements were not admissible.
The investigating officer had allegedly pressured him into admitting to certain actions. The officer had reportedly even promised him a reduced non-capital charge.
However, the investigating officer denied the man’s claims.
A High Court judgement apparently stated that the man’s fear of the investigating officer seemed to have “been wholly self-induced” if he was as afraid of the officer as he claimed.
The judge subsequently found that all the man’s statements were given on his own accord and therefore admissible as evidence.
First woman to be executed in the country since 2004
A 45-year-old woman named Saridewi Djamani is the other prisoner facing execution.
She was sentenced to death in 2018 for trafficking around 30g of diamorphine.
Source: Hennie Stander on Unsplash, for illustration purposes only
Saridewi said at trial that she had not been able to give accurate statements to the police. This was supposedly due to her suffering from drug withdrawal at the time.
She then testified during a remitted hearing in 2022 that she had symptoms of methamphetamine withdrawal. Therefore, she was not “able to think properly” when she gave her statement.
On the contrary, a High Court judge later found that she had “at most been suffering from mild to moderate” withdrawal.
However, the judge noted that the symptoms were “minimal and not noticeable”. The symptoms thus did not negatively affect her ability to give statements.
Saridewi is notably the first woman facing execution in Singapore in almost two decades. The last known execution of a woman in the country was in 2004, according to TJC.
United Press International (UPI) reported that 37-year-old Yen May Woen was arrested and sentenced to death for possession of 120 packets of heroin.
She was hanged at Changi Prison on 19 March 2004.
Collective condemns ‘ruthless and unjust’ executions in Singapore
TJC concluded its statement by emphasising that it condemns Singapore’s determination to keep taking lives as part of a “ruthless and unjust” war on drugs.
“We reiterate our call for a moratorium on the use of the death penalty pending a full and independent review of the capital punishment regime in Singapore,” it added.
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Featured image adapted from Law and Inmates Education.
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