Singapore court rejects intellectually disabled man’s final execution appeal

“The Court docket of Attraction has simply dismissed the applying and thought of the attraction an abuse of course of and that worldwide regulation doesn’t apply. Nagaenthran who’s mentally disabled is because of be hanged presumably within the subsequent few days,” mentioned M. Ravi, who was a part of Dharmalingam’s authorized workforce, in a Fb put up Tuesday.

In his ruling, Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon mentioned there was “no admissible proof exhibiting any decline within the appellant’s psychological situation after the fee of the offense.”

“The case mounted by the appellant’s counsel was baseless and with out advantage, each as a matter of truth and of regulation,” Menon mentioned, in response to courtroom paperwork.

The courtroom additionally dismissed a request for Dharmalingam to be assessed by an impartial panel of psychiatrists.

That attraction listening to was then postponed as a result of Dharmalingam contracted Covid-19. Tuesday’s verdict on the attraction exhausts Dharmalingam’s authorized choices.

Anti-death penalty group Reprieve mentioned Dharmalingam is dealing with imminent execution except he’s pardoned by Singapore’s President Halimah Yacob.

“We’re extraordinarily involved about rushed hearings and choices on this case, in violation of Nagaenthran’s honest trial rights. Nagaenthran ought to be shielded from the dying penalty due to his mental incapacity,” Reprieve director Maya Foa mentioned in an announcement.

“The guts-wrenching indisputable fact that he believes he’s going dwelling to his household and talks about sharing home-cooked meals with them exhibits that he doesn’t totally perceive he faces execution and lacks the psychological competency to be executed.”

Dying sentence

Singapore has a number of the strictest drug legal guidelines on the planet.

Trafficking a specific amount of medication — for instance, 15 grams (0.5 ounces) of heroin — ends in a compulsory dying sentence below the Misuse of Medication Act. It was solely just lately — and after Dharmalingam’s case started — that the regulation was amended to permit for a convicted particular person to flee the dying penalty in sure circumstances.

Dharmalingam’s attorneys argued he mustn’t have been sentenced to dying below Singaporean regulation as a result of he was incapable of understanding his actions.

They mentioned a psychologist assessed his IQ to be 69, which is internationally acknowledged as an mental incapacity. At his trial, the protection additionally argued he had extreme consideration deficit hyperactivity dysfunction (ADHD), borderline mental functioning, and extreme alcohol use dysfunction.

Dharmalingam has spent a decade on dying row and through that point his situation additional deteriorated, his attorneys mentioned.

“He has not an excellent sense of what’s occurring round him,” N. Surendran, a Malaysian lawyer who’s representing Dharmalingam’s household, and adviser to Malaysian NGO Legal professionals for Liberty, mentioned in November. “He’s disoriented. He is received no actual clue of what’s going to occur to him.”

Surendran mentioned executing Dharmalingam “could be tantamount to executing a toddler.”

The courtroom on Tuesday, nevertheless, mentioned there was no admissible proof exhibiting any decline in Dharmalingam’s psychological situation.

The choose dominated the attorneys’ assertions of Dharmalingam’s psychological decline had been “self-serving” and “not supported by something in any respect.” Menon, the chief justice, mentioned the protection proceedings had been carried in a approach meant to delay the execution, in response to courtroom paperwork.

“This contains the very fact his sentence was imposed as a compulsory punishment and for an offense that doesn’t meet the edge of the ‘most critical crimes’ to which the usage of the dying penalty should be restricted below worldwide regulation,” Amnesty mentioned.