INDEX

That the European area is a zone free of capital punishment is the result of a complex process of restraints that has evolved over the last 50 years. Domestic, regional and universal international law, as well as certain components within each level, have influenced each other to produce a dynamic, circular movement towards abolition. Starting from the internal level, restraints on the death penalty rose up to the regional and universal levels, and then descended back down into domestic law. This process, however, has not produced a completely closed circle, and certain countries in Europe retain legislation permitting recourse to the death penalty for certain crimes, especially war crimes and, according to recent interpretations, criminal offences related to terrorist activity. Extradition or other administrative mechanisms of expulsion also illustrate potential disjunctions in the circle, as they may allow persons to be transferred to retentionist countries. Even though the legislative framework has significantly evolved in the last few years, the dominant role played by political evaluations creates new fissures in the abolitionist circle. Only recently have new abolitionist perspectives emerged from the ‘right of interference’ in foreign death penalty cases, which some countries try to exercise when their own nationals are involved.

• Document type Article
• Themes list Networks,

Drawing from televised debates over capital punishment on CNN’s Crossfire from February 2000 to June 2002, I argue that Teles’s (1998) theory of “dissensus politics” is useful in understanding the U.S.’s preservation of capital punishment as well as current divisions in death penalty sentiment within the U.S. I pose the retention of capital punishment as the product of rival elites who are unwilling to forsake capital punishment’s moral character (and often the political benefits it offers), and who consequently ignore an American public that appears to have reached a measured consensus of doubt about the death penalty.

• Document type Article
• Countries list United States
• Themes list Public opinion, Public debate,

Part I of this Article will discuss the Court’s prior decisions in Booth and Gathers, and Parts II and III will briefly attempt to clarify the parameters of the Payne holding. Part IV of this Article will survey the current legal landscape of state and federal practice regarding the admissibility of VIE and argument. Finally, this Article will offer in conclusion some brief perspectives on several unresolved issues in this particularly thorny (and misguided) area of capital punishment jurisprudence.

• Document type Article
• Countries list United States
• Themes list Murder Victims' Families,

Part I of this Article examines the evolution of victims from interested parties to participants giving sentencing recommendations. Part II examines the constitutionality of victim sentencing participation laws and explains why crime victims’ sentencing recommendations in capital cases are constitutional. In Part III, this Article shows how existing judicial procedures provide adequate constitutional safeguards. Finally, Part IV demonstrates how victims of capital homicide are harmed when the law denies them the ability to recommend sentences

• Document type Article
• Countries list United States
• Themes list Murder Victims' Families,

European executions obeyed a complex model that the author proposes to call ‘the supplice pattern’. The term supplice designates tortures and tormented executions, but it also includes their cultural background. The European way of executing used religious deeds, aesthetic devices and performing arts techniques which themselves called for artistic representations through paintings, theatre, etc. Moreover, Christian civilisation was unique in the belief that the spectacle of a painful execution had a redemptive effect on the criminals and the attendants as well. Chinese executions obeyed an entirely different conception. They were designed to show that punishment fitted the crime as provided in the penal code. All details were aimed to highlight and inculcate the meaning of the law, while signs of emotions, deeds, words, that could have interfered with the lesson in law were prohibited. In China, capital executions were not organized as a show nor subject to aesthetic representations, and they had no redemptive function. This matter-of-fact way of executing people caused Westerners deep uneasiness. The absence of religious background and staging devices was interpreted as a sign of barbarity and cruelty. What was stigmatised was not so much the facts that their failure to conform to the ‘supplice pattern’ that constituted for any Westerner the due process of capital executions.

• Document type Article
• Countries list China
• Themes list Networks,

The report also discusses the issue of capital punishment and makes reference to death penalty cases in which the Special Rapporteur has intervened in reaction to reports that the sentences concerned had been passed in violation of international restrictions and human rights standards.

• Document type International law - United Nations
• Themes list Trend Towards Abolition,
• Available languages Las ejecuciones extrajudiciales, sumarias o arbitrarias: Informe de la Relatora Especial, Asma Jahangir, presentado en cumplimiento de la resolución 2002/36 de la Comisión de Derechos HumanosВнесудебные казни, казни без надлежащего судебного разбирательства или произвольные казни: Доклад Специального докладчика Асмы Джахангир, представленный в соответствии с резолюцией 2002/36 Комиссии по правам человека法外处决、即审即决或任意处决: 特别报告员阿斯玛·贾汉吉尔根据人权委员会第 2002/36 号决议提交的报告حالات الإعدام خارج نطاق القضاء أو بإجراء اتموجة أو تعسفاً تقرير المقرر الخاص اسمة جهانقير, مقدم مطابقا لقرار لجنة الحقوق الانسان 2002/36Exécutions extrajudiciaires, sommaires ou arbitraires: Rapport de la Rapporteuse spéciale, Mme Asma Jahangir, soumis en application de la résolution 2002/36 de la Commission des droits de l’homme

The report also discusses the issue of capital punishment and makes reference to death penalty cases in which the Special Rapporteur has intervened in reaction to reports that the sentences concerned had been passed in violation of international restrictions and human rights standards.

• Document type International law - United Nations
• Themes list Trend Towards Abolition,
• Available languages Las ejecuciones extrajudiciales, sumarias o arbitrarias: Informe de la Relatora Especial, Asma Jahangir法外处决、即审即决或任意处决: 特别报告员阿斯玛·贾汉吉尔Exécutions extrajudiciaires, sommaires ou arbitraires: Rapport de la Rapporteuse spéciale, Mme Asma JahangirВнесудебные, суммарные и произвольные казни: Отчет специального докладчика Асмы Джахангир (Asma Jahangir)حالات الإعدام خارج نطاق القضاء أو بإجراء اتموجة أو تعسفاً تقرير المقرر الخاص اسمة جهانقير

The present report contains information covering the period from January 2001 through December 2002, in order to ensure that there are no gaps in coverage since the last version of the sixth quinquennial report which covered information up to the end of 2000. The report indicates that the trend towards abolition of the death penalty continues, which is illustrated, inter alia, by the increase in the number of ratifications of international instruments that provide for the abolition of this punishment.

• Document type International law - United Nations
• Themes list Trend Towards Abolition,
• Available languages Cuestión de la pena capital: Informe del Secretario General presentado de conformidad con la resolución 2002/77 de la ComisiónВопрос о смертной казни: Доклад Генерального секретаря, представляемый в соответствии с резолюцией 2002/77 Комиссии死刑问题: 秘书长按照委员会第2002/77 号决议提交的报告الموضوع العقوبة الاعدام : تقرير الأمين العام مقدم بشأن قرار اللجنة للحقوق الانسان 2002/77Question de la peine de mort: Rapport du Secrétaire général présenté en application de la résolution 2002/77

The purpose of the Report is to assist the Honourable Court by describing the criminal justice process in Trinidad as it applies to those accused of murder. As a criminal defence and constitutional law attorneys in Trinidad, we have been asked to address, in particular, some of the shortcomings apparent in the Trinidadian criminal justice system and certain related constitutional issues. The Report deals with the following issues: a. The constitutional history and sources of law in Trinidad; b. The law of murder in Trinidad; c. An overview of criminal procedure; d. The stages of the criminal process in murder cases; e. The mandatory death penalty; f. The prerogative of mercy.

• Document type NGO report
• Themes list Networks,

Reviews the use of the death penalty on juveniles in light of contemporary standards.

• Document type NGO report
• Themes list Juveniles,