Return to capital punishment may be in the making
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Return to capital punishment may be in the making |
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Contact: Shannon Lebourne
Monday 17 January 2011 – The government of Saint Lucia has sounded its intention to enforce the country’s capital punishment laws in response to an upsurge in criminality.
While stressing that the death penalty is still on Saint Lucia’s law books, the island’s Attorney General Honourable Lorenzo Rudolph Francis lamented that the incidence of violent crime in the country is intolerable.
Senator Francis says it is government’s hope that enforcement of the death penalty will serve as a deterrent to would–be perpetrators of crimes by sending a strong message.
“Capital punishment is still in our laws. Many people ask why isn’t the law being enforced? but you can’t just go and hang someone; there is a process and we will be exploring that process, so we want people to know that.”
The government’s intention to enforce the death penalty in Saint Lucia coincides with a similar decision by the Government in the twin-island Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, where Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar said last Friday—January 15—that her government proposed to bring a bill to amend the constitution so that the death penalty can be carried out without hindrance.
The issue is expected to stimulate serious debate and discussion in the House of Parliament when the government of Saint Lucia introduces a suite of new anti-crime legislation later this month.
One man who was convicted of killing a police officer is currently on death row at the Bordelais Correctional Facility. |
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