Jack Warner's crusade to hang convicted killers could be closer to reality. A report in the Trinidad Express quoted an unidentified convicted murderer as saying the trap door used in the hangings greased as part of the cleanup.
However, Prisons Commissioner John Rougier told the Express the cleaning is routine, adding that he has not received any official information regarding the resumption of hangings.
"It has nothing to do with any plan or anything like that," he assured the paper. He said it is normal to have the equipment working to ensure that there is no mishap in case the prison has to carry out an execution.
The Express said there are about 35 convicted prisoners in the condemned section of the prison.
It quoted prison sources as saying only one of the convicted killers, Ronald John, is eligible to be hanged. It said John was sentenced to death on February 8, 2006, for the murder of club proprietor Kenneth Boxie during a robbery at Boxie's Starlite Recreation Club in Palmyra Village, San Fernando, on November 27, 2002.
If he is not executed within five years, then his sentence would have to be commuted to life in prison. John has a petition pending before the Advisory Committee on the Power of Pardon (Mercy Committee) and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.
The last person to be hanged in Trinidad and Tobago was Anthony Briggs, who was executed on July 28 1999, for the murder of a taxi-driver.
One month before that the State hanged drug lord Dole Chadee and eight of his accomplices who were condemned to death for killing several members of one family.
The hangings took place during the Panday UNC administration when Ramesh L. maharaj was Attorney General.
No comments:
Post a Comment