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Capital punishment in Singapore is a legal penalty. Executions in Singapore are carried out by long drop hanging,[1] and usually take place at dawn. Thirty-three offences—including murder, drug trafficking, terrorism, use of firearms and kidnapping—warrant the death penalty under Singapore law.
In 2012, Singapore amended its laws to exempt some offences from the mandatory death sentence.[2] In a 2005 survey by The Straits Times, 95% of Singaporeans were of the view that their country should retain the death penalty.[3] The support steadily fell throughout the years due to the increasing liberal opinions of society. Despite the decline, a large majority of the public remains supportive of the use of the death penalty, with more than 80% of Singaporeans believing that their country should retain the death penalty in 2021.[4]
The most recent execution conducted in Singapore took place on 16 October 2024, when 64-year-old Sulaiman bin Jumari, a Singaporean national, was hanged for drug trafficking.[5][6]
Section 316 of the Criminal Procedure Code states that the death penalty in Singapore is to be conducted by hanging.[1]
Hangings always take place at dawn and are conducted by the long drop method. The Singapore government has affirmed its choice of execution by hanging in favour of other methods.[7]
It is a normal practice for everyone present in the courtroom to stand and remain silent before the death sentence is passed.[8] The judge will then proceed to announce the death sentence on the accused, who has been found guilty and convicted of the capital offence. The condemned will be given notice at least four days before execution. In the case of foreigners sentenced to death, their families and diplomatic missions or embassies will be given one to two weeks' notice.[9]
Persons under the age of 18 at the time of their offence and pregnant women cannot be sentenced to death.
Previously, offenders under 18 at the time of their offences would be indefinitely detained at the president's pleasure (TPP), with the normal period of detention having been between 10 and 20 years. These inmates would be released after receiving clemency from the President of Singapore, once they were assessed to be suitable for release.
In 2010, the law was amended to allow judges to mete out life imprisonment to offenders convicted of capital offences, but aged below 18 at the time of their crimes. They would be required to serve a minimum of 20 years before they can be reviewed for possible release. As for women who were pregnant at the time of their sentencing, they would automatically be sentenced to life imprisonment upon their conviction of any capital offences, though there have been no such cases as of yet.[10]
The first underaged offender to be sentenced to life imprisonment after the abolition of TPP was Myanmar national Zin Mar Nwe, a domestic worker who killed the mother-in-law of her employer in June 2018, and Zin was 17 years old at the time of the offence. She received a life sentence in July 2023 after the High Court found her guilty of murder, with the trial judge Andre Maniam accepting that Zin was a minor and below 18 years old when killing the 70-year-old victim and he thus opted to not impose a death sentence in her case.[11]
Persons proven to be of unsound mind when they commit capital crimes, once found guilty, are not to be given the death penalty. These offenders can be sentenced to another form of indefinite detention under TPP, being detained at medical facilities, prisons or at some other safe places in custody, and subject to psychiatric review of their mental conditions until suitable for release.[10]
Before they were abolished in 1970, jury trials were conducted to hear capital cases in Singapore since the British colonial era. Based on the verdict of a jury, if a person was found guilty, the judge would convict and impose a penalty to the defendant in accordance to the charge he or she was found guilty of. One notable case in which a person was sentenced to death in a jury trial was the trial of Sunny Ang Soo Suan, who allegedly murdered his girlfriend Jenny Cheok Cheng Kid during a scuba diving trip in 1963. Despite the circumstantial evidence and the absence of the victim's body, the seven-men jury unanimously found Ang guilty of murder and sentenced him to death. Ang was eventually hanged on 6 February 1967 after he lost all his appeals to both the Court of Appeal and the Privy Council, and the failure of his clemency plea to President Yusof Ishak.[12]
The first person to be tried before two judges in the High Court and sentenced to death for a capital case was armed robber Teo Cheng Leong, who was found guilty and sentenced in February 1970 for unlawfully discharging a firearm twice when he fired two missed shots at a police officer.[13] Another notable case was the kidnapping and murder of Ong Beang Leck, the son of a rich tycoon. Five men were involved in the abduction and they had murdered Ong after luring him into a rented car on 24 May 1968. Three of the kidnappers were found guilty of murder and sentenced to death in June 1970.[14] In the first case of a woman being sentenced to death in Singapore, dance hostess Mimi Wong Weng Siu was convicted of murdering Ayako Watanabe out of jealousy in 1970 and received the death sentence in the same trial as her ex-husband Sim Woh Kum, who assisted her in killing the Japanese victim, who was the wife of Wong's Japanese boyfriend. The couple were executed on 27 July 1973.[15][16]
Since the amendment of the Criminal Procedure Code in 1992, all capital cases have been heard by a single judge in the High Court instead of two judges. After conviction and sentencing, the offender has the option of making an appeal to the Court of Appeal. If the appeal fails, the final recourse rests with the President of Singapore, who has the power to grant clemency on the advice of the Cabinet. In exceptional cases since 2012, the Court of Appeal would be asked to review its previous decisions in concluded criminal appeals where it was necessary to correct a miscarriage of justice, most of which involved drug cases attracting the death penalty. The exact number of successful appeals is unknown. In November 1995, one Poh Kay Keong had his conviction overturned after the court found that his statement to a Central Narcotics Bureau officer had been made under duress.[17] Another was the case of Nadasan Chandra Secharan, who was initially convicted of murder and sentenced to death by the High Court in June 1996, but later acquitted of murder by the Court of Appeal in January 1997 after they found the evidence against him was insufficient to show that he had murdered his lover Ramapiram Kannickaisparry.[18][19] Another case was that of Ismil bin Kadar, who was initially sentenced to death for a 2005 robbery-murder case in Boon Lay, but eventually acquitted of the crime as the Court of Appeal found that based on the evidence, Ismil was not involved in the case and that it was solely his younger brother Muhammad bin Kadar who was responsible for the robbery and murder; Muhammad was subsequently executed in April 2015.[20][21]
Successful clemency applications are thought to be even rarer. Since 1965, the presidential clemency has been granted six times to death row inmates, whose sentences were all commuted to life imprisonment (not counting the clemency pleas of the underaged offenders serving TPP).[22] The last presidential clemency to be granted was in April 1998, when President Ong Teng Cheong pardoned a 19-year-old death row inmate and convicted murderer Mathavakannan Kalimuthu, commuting his death sentence to life imprisonment.[23][24][25]
Previously, other than the Court of Appeal, offenders were allowed to file criminal or civil appeals to the Privy Council in London, where the judges could hear their appeals once they exhausted all avenues of appeal in Singapore. This avenue of appeal was fully abolished for all criminal and civil matters in April 1994. One case in which an appeal to the Privy Council was successful was the case of murderer Mohamed Yasin bin Hussin. Nineteen-year-old Yasin robbed, raped and murdered a 58-year-old woman at Pulau Ubin in April 1972. He was sentenced to death for murder in 1974 and lost his appeal before the Privy Council accepted his appeal and sentenced him to two years' imprisonment for causing death while committing a rash/negligent act.[26]
In July 2012, the government made a review of the mandatory death penalty applied to certain drug trafficking or murder offences. In the midst of this review, a moratorium was imposed on all the 35 pending executions in Singapore at that time (7 for murder and 28 for drug trafficking). During that period of the review of the mandatory death penalty, one convicted murderer, Pathip Selvan s/o Sugumaran, who made headlines for the violent murder of his girlfriend in 2008, won his appeal in October 2012 and was re-sentenced to 20 years' imprisonment for culpable homicide.[27][28] Wang Zhijian, a Chinese national who committed the 2008 Yishun triple murders, was sentenced to death for a conviction of murder under Section 300(a) of the Penal Code in November 2012,[29][30] and another unnamed death row convict died of natural causes while in prison.[31]
In November 2012, capital punishment laws in Singapore were revised such that the mandatory death penalty for those convicted of drug trafficking or murder was lifted under certain specific conditions. Judges were empowered with the discretion to sentence such offenders to life imprisonment with the possibility of parole after 20 years. These changes were approved by Parliament and set to take effect in January of the following year.[32]
In January 2013, the law was again amended to make the death penalty no longer mandatory for certain capital offences. Judges in Singapore were given a discretion to impose a sentence of life imprisonment with mandatory caning for offenders who commit murder but had no intention to kill, which come under Sections 300(b), 300(c) and 300(d) of the Penal Code. The death penalty remains mandatory only for murders committed with the intent to kill, which come under section 300(a) of the Penal Code. Provided that drug traffickers only act as couriers, suffer from impaired mental responsibility (e.g. depression), or substantively assist the authorities in tackling drug trafficking activities, among other conditions, judges also had the discretion to impose life sentences instead of death. Drug traffickers who were not condemned to death but to life-long incarceration with caning would receive at least 15 strokes of the cane, unless suffering from mental incapacity. Despite this discretion, a sentence of life imprisonment is the mandatory minimum penalty for capital murder or drug trafficking offences.
The first person to be sentenced to life imprisonment, instead of receiving the death penalty, under the amended death penalty laws was drug trafficker Abdul Haleem bin Abdul Karim on 10 April 2013, having been a courier in traffic drugs and had assisted the authorities in disrupting the drug trafficking activities. In addition to his life sentence, Abdul Haleem, who pleaded guilty to two charges of drug trafficking, was also given the maximum sentence of 24 strokes of the cane.[33][34] Abdul Haleem's accomplice, Muhammad Ridzuan bin Md Ali, on the other hand, was sentenced to death for drug trafficking and later hanged on 19 May 2017.[35]
After the changes to the law, the first executions to take place were those of drug traffickers Tang Hai Liang and Foong Chee Peng on 18 July 2014, after their sentences were finalized and their refusal to further appeal against their sentences.[31]
The amendments of the law also offered a chance for all current death row inmates to have their cases to be reviewed for re-sentencing.[36][37] Some death row inmates declined to be re-sentenced, including Tang Hai Liang and Foong Chee Peng.[31] The below cases are known cases where death row inmates applied for re-sentencing.
On 14 January 2015, a landmark ruling was made by the Court of Appeal in the prosecution's appeal against the re-sentencing case of one former death row inmate, Kho Jabing, who was re-sentenced to life imprisonment and 24 strokes of the cane for the murder of Chinese national Cao Ruyin during a robbery under Section 300(c) of the Penal Code of Singapore. The landmark judgement in which the court, by a majority decision of 3–2, overturned Kho's life sentence and sentenced him to death a second time, had set the main guiding principles for all judges in Singapore to decide if the death penalty is appropriate for those murder cases committed with no intention to kill while exercising their discretion to impose either a life term or death for offenders responsible for such.[64]
The main guiding principles set were as such:
In Kho's case, the majority three of the five judges were satisfied that Kho, who had used a tree branch to bash Cao's head repeatedly (resulting in a completely shattered skull that caused Cao to die in a coma six days after the attack), had demonstrated both a blatant disregard for human life and viciousness while committing the crime, and Kho's actions were such that they had outraged the feelings of the community. Due to this, Kho was once again given the death penalty and he was eventually hanged on 20 May 2016,[46][47] at 3:30 pm after his appeal for a stay of execution was dismissed that same morning, a rare occurrence of an execution not carried out at dawn on Friday.[65]
Consequently, the guiding principles from Kho's case also impacted several subsequent murder cases and influenced the sentencing or appeal outcomes of these murder cases, which include the 2010 Kallang slashing,[66][67] the 2016 Gardens by the Bay murder,[68] the 2016 Circuit Road murder,[69][70] the 2016 Azlin Arujunah case[71] and the 2013 murder of Dexmon Chua Yizhi,[72][73][74] etc.
In addition to the Penal Code, there are four Acts of Parliament that prescribe death as punishment for offences. According to the Think Centre, a Singaporean civil rights group, 70% of hangings are for drug-related offences.[75] All eight hangings in 2017 were for drug-related offences that year, and 11 of 13 hangings in 2018 were also for drug-related offences.[76]
Under the Penal Code,[77] the commission of the following offences may result in the death penalty:
Since the Penal Code (Amendment) Act 2007,[78] Singapore no longer allows for the death penalty for rape and mutiny.
The Arms Offences Act regulates criminal offences dealing with firearms and weapons.[79] Any person who uses or attempts to use arms (Section 4) can face execution, as well as any person who uses or attempts to use arms to commit scheduled offences (Section 4A). These scheduled offences are being a member of an unlawful assembly; rioting; certain offences against the person; abduction or kidnapping; extortion; burglary; robbery; preventing or resisting arrest; vandalism; mischief. Any person who is an accomplice (Section 5) to a person convicted of arms use during a scheduled offence can likewise be hanged.
Trafficking in arms (Section 6) is a capital offence in Singapore. Under the Arms Offences Act, trafficking is defined as being in unlawful possession of more than two firearms.
One notable case involving a conviction under this act was the murder of Lim Hock Soon, where Ang Soon Tong triad leader Tan Chor Jin used a Beretta pistol to fatally shoot Lim, a nightclub owner, to death after robbing him and his family of their valuables. Tan was initially charged under the Penal Code for murder but the charge was later amended into one of illegal discharge of firearms under the Arms Offences Act. Tan was eventually convicted and executed by hanging under this Act on 9 January 2009.[80]
Since 1975, after the proposal by then Minister for Home Affairs Chua Sian Chin, the death penalty was mandated as the sole punishment for drug trafficking, should the amount of whichever drugs exceed the capital threshold.[81] As a result of this legal reform, 28-year-old Penang-born Malaysian Teh Sin Tong became the first convicted drug trafficker to be hanged at Changi Prison on 28 April 1978, after the High Court found him guilty on 13 October 1976 (a year after the new laws took effect) for trafficking 254.7g of diamorphine across the Woodlands Checkpoint just six months prior to his sentencing.[82]
Under Schedule 2 of the Misuse of Drugs Act,[83][84] any person importing or exporting more than the following quantities of drugs receives a mandatory death sentence:
Death sentences are also mandatory for any person caught manufacturing:
Under the Act:
any person who is proved to have had in his possession or custody or under his control —
- anything containing a controlled drug;
- the keys of anything containing a controlled drug;
- the keys of any place or premises or any part thereof in which a controlled drug is found; or
- a document of title relating to a controlled drug or any other document intended for the delivery of a controlled drug,
shall, until the contrary is proved, be presumed to have had that drug in his possession.
Furthermore, any person who has a controlled drug in his possession shall be presumed to have known the nature of that drug.[citation needed]
The majority of executions in Singapore are for drug offences. Since 2010, 23 prisoners have been executed for drug offences, while only five have been executed for other offences, such as murder. Death penalty supporters, such as blogger Benjamin Chang, claim that Singapore has one of the lowest prevalence of drug abuse worldwide. Chang claims, for instance, that over two decades, the number of drug abusers arrested each year has declined by two-thirds, from over 6,000 in the early 1990s to about 2,000 in 2011.[85] The validity of these figures is disputed by other Singaporeans, such as drugs counsellor Tony Tan.[86] The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime notes that Singapore remains a transit destination for drug traffickers in Asia, drug seizures continue to increase, and heroin drug use within Singapore is continuing to rise.[87]
Ironically, Singapore's reputation for having some of the toughest anti drug laws in the world has in the past made it an attractive transit point for drug traffickers, as foreign airport officials knew the vast majority people would not risk the death penalty for carrying drugs via the city state. In 1989, Central Narcotics Bureau director Poh Geok Ek stated that drug syndicates pick Singapore as a transit point as they believe foreign law enforcement agencies would be less stringent in checking their couriers on arrival if their flight departed from Singapore, rather than from other neighbouring drug producing countries that are high on their priority list.[88]
In 1993, a Central Narcotics Bureau officer stated that the drug traffickers they targeted could be graded into two broad categories: Singaporeans and Malaysians supplying the local market, and foreigners only transiting through Singapore while on the way to North America and Europe. The same source estimated that 70 percent of the traffickers arrested in Singapore belong to the first category, and smuggle in relatively small amounts of low quality Number 3 heroin (with less than 5 percent purity)[89] from Malaysia, often via the Johor–Singapore Causeway. The other 30 percent in the second category are usually Thais, Hongkongers, Nigerians or Europeans, who smuggle large quantities of high quality Number 4 heroin (with more than 80 percent purity)[90] from Thailand via Singapore and onwards to North America or Europe, and have no intention of distributing the narcotics in Singapore itself. They do this in the belief that customs officers will be less strict when they arrive at their destination as they had transited via Singapore, he added.[91]
The preamble of the Internal Security Act states that it is an Act to "provide for the internal security of Singapore, preventive detention, the prevention of subversion, the suppression of organised violence against persons and property in specified areas of Singapore, and for matters incidental thereto".[92] The President has the power to designate certain security areas. Any person caught in the possession or with someone in possession of firearms, ammunition or explosives in a security area can be punished by death.
The terms of the Kidnapping Act designate abduction, wrongful restraint or wrongful confinement for ransom as capital offences. The punishment is this case is death by hanging or imprisonment for life and, if the offender is not sentenced to death, he is also liable to caning.[93]
A 1978 newspaper article described the death row section of the original Changi Prison as consisting of 24 cells arranged in a horse shoe shaped block around an open air grassy exercise yard. The exercise area itself was enclosed in steel bars and had a wire mesh roof to prevent escape by helicopter.[94] Amnesty International reports that death row inmates are housed in cells of roughly three square metres (32 square feet).[17] Walls make up three sides, while the fourth is made up of vertical bars. They are equipped with a toilet, a sleeping mat, and a bucket for washing. Exercise is permitted twice a day for half an hour at a time.[9] Four days before the execution, the condemned is allowed to watch television or listen to the radio.[17]
Special meals of their choice are also cooked, if within the prison budget. In 1994, inmates had a budget of S$22 for their last meal.[95] One documented last meal of an inmate was the last meal order of Tangaraju Suppiah, who asked for chicken rice, ice cream soda, nasi biryani and Milo-flavoured sweets before his hanging, while another was John Martin Scripps, who ordered a pizza and a cup of hot chocolate before his execution.[96][97]
Visiting rights are increased from one 20-minute visit per week to a maximum of four hours each day,[9] though no physical contact is allowed with any visitors.[17] In addition, two days before an execution, an inmate is allowed to have a photo shoot and be given their own clothes to pose during a photoshoot; the photo will be given to their families as remembrance.[98]
Public debate in the Singaporean news media on the death penalty is almost non-existent, although the topic is occasionally discussed in the midst of highly publicised criminal cases.[citation needed] Efforts to garner public opinion on the issue are rare, although it has been suggested that the population is influenced by a legalist philosophy which holds that harsh punishment deters crime and helps maintain social peace and harmony.[99] In October 2007, Senior Minister of State for Law and Home Affairs Ho Peng Kee said in Parliament that "Certain of us may hold the view that the death penalty should be abolished. But in a survey done two years ago, reported in the Straits Times, 95% of Singaporeans feel that the death penalty should stay. This is something which has helped us to be safe and secure all these years and it is only reserved for a very few select offences."[3]
Joshua Benjamin Jeyaretnam, an opposition Member of Parliament, was reportedly only given a few minutes to speak in Parliament on the issue before his comments were rebutted by Ho Peng Kee.[17][100]
There were a few instances where in certain high-profile cases, the public would argue for the death penalty to be imposed on those who allegedly committed murder. In the case of Annie Ee Yu Lian who was abused and murdered by her two friends, some Singaporeans were angered at the cruelty displayed by the offenders and felt that the sentences (which were between 14 and 16 years) for grievous hurt were too light, which prompted them to petition for harsher punishments; some even demanded for the death penalty to be imposed on the couple.[101][102][103] In another case regarding the death of four-year-old Mohamad Daniel Mohamad Nasser due to child abuse perpetuated by his mother and her boyfriend, some Singaporeans felt that their sentences of ten to eleven years were too light and petitioned to the courts to sentence the couple to death.[104][105]
Younger generations of Singaporeans tend to have a more liberal approach towards drug use. The government, in response, has introduced education programmes on the dangers of drugs.[106] There were cases of ex-drug convicts who also advocated against the use of drugs; some even agree that the death penalty was effective. A former trafficker once stated that in the past, he would always make sure the measurement of his delivered drugs were below the minimum amount to avoid capital punishment.[107] A female prisoner and drug convict also spoke up about the death penalty while being interviewed in prison, where she was serving 26 years' jail since 2014. She agreed to the relevance and effect of the death penalty in stopping people from selling and taking drugs, as she knew how drug trafficking caused damage to families and inflict sufferings especially to the children of drug addicts.[108] Simon Khung, a social media influencer who eventually stopped taking drugs after the 2020 murder of his daughter Megan Khung (who was allegedly killed by her mother),[109] told a newspaper in 2024 that he supported the death penalty for drug trafficking, as he felt that the drug situation in Singapore would grow worse in the absence of capital punishment and more people would become drug abusers and ruin their lives like he and the former abusers had in their pasts; Khung's stance was supported by other ex-abusers, and one of them, Bruce Mathieu (who overcame his drug addiction seven years prior), said that the death penalty had deterred him from resorting to drug smuggling.[110]
In the aftermath of several executions, there were discussions among the Singaporean public about the need for compassion for some death row inmates, owing to arguments that many death row inmates had come from low-income families or had drug addictions before ending up on death row. However, the public sentiments remained leaning towards capital punishment for drugs, owing to arguments concerning rampant rates of drug trafficking in the Golden Triangle in Southeast Asia, the effectiveness of the death penalty in maintaining Singapore's low crime rate, and the impact drugs have had on the addicts and their families.[111]
When 31-year-old Singaporean Shen Hanjie was sentenced to death for trafficking 34.94g of pure heroin in October 2022,[112] a huge majority of the netizens showed support for the death sentence in Shen's case, with some expressing sympathy for his family, especially his parents. Most of the supporters also stated that the death sentence should be deployed for drug crimes due to its strong deterrent effect.[113] Shen's death sentence was subsequently upheld after he lost his appeal on 1 March 2024.[114]
When CNN covered the topic of Singapore's death penalty and Changi Prison in October 2024, it was noted that the death penalty continued to thrive with huge public support, and there were about 40 inmates on death row as of the time when CNN covered the issue exclusively. An inmate, a former schoolteacher who introduced himself as Matthew, stated he believed in the deterrent effect of the death penalty for drug trafficking; Matthew was then serving a seven-year jail term for non-capital drug charges. However, his sentiments were not shared by the family members of death row inmates who spoke to CNN. Haslinda Ismail, whose son Muhammed Izwan bin Borhan was sentenced to death for diamorphine trafficking, stated that she was devastated over the outcome and felt resentful towards the government for not giving her son a second chance; Izwan remained on death row awaiting to be hanged as of the time of writing. Similarly, Nazeri Lajim's sister, Nazira Lajim, who was an anti-death penalty activist, stated that she was sad and angry that her brother was executed despite her push for a life sentence, and likely duo to her brother's hanging in 2022, Nazira encouraged her adult children to permanently leave Singapore and emigrate to Australia.[115]
Before the hanging of Shanmugam Murugesu, a three-hour vigil was held on 6 May 2005. The organisers of the event at the Furama Hotel said it was the first such public gathering organised solely by members of the public against the death penalty in Singapore. Murugesu had been arrested after being caught in possession of six packets containing just over 1 kg of cannabis after returning from Malaysia. He admitted knowledge of one of the packets, which contained 300 grams, but not the other five.[116][117] The event was reportedly unreported by mainstream media outlets, and was later shut down by the police.[116][118]
After the hanging of Australian citizen Van Tuong Nguyen on 2 December 2005, Susan Chia, province leader of the Good Shepherd Sisters in Singapore, declared that "the death penalty is cruel, inhumane and it violates the right to life." Chia and several other nuns comforted Nguyen's mother two weeks before his execution for heroin trafficking.[119]
Singapore's death penalty laws have drawn comments in the media. For example, science fiction author William Gibson, while a journalist, wrote a travel piece on Singapore that he sarcastically titled "Disneyland with the Death Penalty".[120]
In 2010, British author Alan Shadrake published his book, Once a Jolly Hangman: Singapore Justice in the Dock, which was critical of the Singapore judicial system.[121] The main criticism of the book asserted that wealthy, often well-connected foreigners, could expect leniency from law enforcement, while the poor and disenfranchised were in effect "summarily executed".[122] Shadrake's book [123] highlighted the contrasting fortunes of German citizen Julia Suzanne Bohl, who ran a major drug ring catering to well off professionals and was herself caught with a capital amount (over 500 grams) of cannabis when police raided her apartment,[124] to Singaporean drug addict Yen May Woen who was caught in possession of 30 grams of low quality heroin. While Bohl had her charges reduced after German diplomatic pressure was allegedly applied amidst much media coverage of her plight and returned to Germany after 3 years imprisonment,[125] the case of Woen received very little coverage in the local newspapers and she was executed [126] after the trial judge handed down the mandatory death sentence.[127]
Shadrake was arrested whilst promoting the book in Singapore and later sentenced to six weeks in prison for contempt of court. He is also charged with criminal defamation. The case attracted worldwide attention, putting the Singapore legal system in the spotlight.[128][129] Shadrake apologised to the court if he had offended the sensitivities of the judiciary and did not mean to undermine the judges or the judiciary, but stood by his book, apart from a mistake contained within.[130] The judge, Quentin Loh, dismissed his apology as "nothing more than a tactical ploy in court to obtain a reduced sentence".[131] Shadrake's conviction for scandalising the court was upheld by the Court of Appeal.[132]
On 5 October 2018, Singapore carried out three executions of drug traffickers - Zainudin bin Mohamed, Abdul Wahid Bin Ismail, and Mohsen Bin Na’im, it led to the Asian Forum for Human Rights and Development (FORUM-ASIA) and 28 civil society organizations in Asia showing condemnation over the triple hangings, and these groups the death sentence was a grave violation of the right to life, which was "the most fundamental and essential human right for other rights to be realized". They also argued that the executions of Zainudin, Abdul Wahid and Mohsen did not serve any purpose for the island-state and its citizens in terms of fulfilling the ends of justice.[133]
In March 2022, when Singapore dismissed the final appeal of Malaysian death row prisoner Nagaenthran K. Dharmalingam and later authorized the execution of Singaporean drug convict Abdul Kahar Othman, which was its first execution during the COVID-19 pandemic, there were 400 Singaporeans, including rights activists Jolovan Wham, Kirsten Han and Kokila Annamalai, who took part in a protest against the government's use of the death penalty at Hong Lim Park.[134][135] With regards to Abdul Kahar's execution, the European Union (EU) condemned it and stated that capital punishment is a cruel and inhumane punishment, which not only failed to deter crime but also defied both humanity's dignity and integrity.[136] Two days prior to Nagaenthran's execution (which took place on 27 April 2022), a candlelight vigil was held on his behalf.[137][138][139]
In October 2023, former Mongolia president Elbegdorj Tsakhia wrote to CNN, expressing his opposition to the death penalty and he cited Singapore as an example. Stating that Mongolia had abolished capital punishment and the crime rate in Mongolia never increased in the aftermath, Elbegdorj stated that he was concerned with the past 16 executions of low to mid-level drug traffickers in Singapore since March 2022, especially the July 2023 hanging of Saridewi Djamani (Singapore's first female to be put to death since 2004), and while he avers his respect for Singapore in terms of its prosperity and stability, Elbegdorj hoped that Singapore could re-evaluate the effectiveness of using the death penalty to curb drug crimes in favour of eventual abolition, due to the death penalty not able to fully uproot the cause of drug trafficking. He also stated that with the newly elected president Tharman Shanmugaratnam taking office, he hoped that the president could affirm the presidential powers of granting clemency to those on death row to soften the government's retentionist stance on capital punishment.[140]
In December 2005, the Law Society revealed that it has set up a committee, named Review Committee on Capital Punishment, to examine capital punishment in the country. The President of the Society, Senior Counsel Philip Jeyaretnam, said that the main focus of the review was on issues regarding administering the death penalty such as whether it should be mandatory. A report of the review would be submitted to the Ministry of Law.[141] On 6 November 2006, they were invited to give its views on proposed amendments to the Penal Code to the Ministry of Home Affairs. In their report, issued on 30 March 2007, they argued against the mandatory death penalty:
The death penalty should be discretionary for the offences where the death sentence is mandatory – murder, drug trafficking, firearms offences and sedition – a position similar to that for the offence of kidnapping. There are strong arguments for changing the mandatory nature of capital punishment in Singapore. Judges should be given the discretion to impose the death penalty only where deemed appropriate.[142]
The Singapore government states that the death penalty is only used in the most serious of crimes, sending, they say, a strong message to potential offenders. They point out that in 1994 and 1999 the United Nations General Assembly failed to adopt United Nations resolutions calling for a moratorium on the death penalty worldwide, as a majority of countries opposed such a move.
Singapore's Permanent Representative to the United Nations wrote a letter to the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions in 2001 which stated:
In January 2004, the Ministry of Home Affairs issued a response to Amnesty International's report, "Singapore: The death penalty - A hidden toll of executions". It defended Singapore's policy to retain the death penalty, predicating its arguments on, among others, the following grounds:[9]
The Ministry of Home Affairs also refuted Amnesty International's claims of the majority of the executed being foreigners, and that it was "mostly the poor, least educated, and vulnerable people who are executed". The Ministry stated: "Singaporeans, and not foreigners, were the majority of those executed... Of those executed from 1993 to 2003, 95% were above 21 years of age, and 80% had received formal education. About 80% of those who had been sentenced to capital punishment had employment before their convictions."[9]
Following the hanging of Van Tuong Nguyen in 2005, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong reiterated the government's position, stating that "The evil inflicted on thousands of people with drug trafficking demands that we must tackle the source by punishing the traffickers rather than trying to pick up the pieces afterwards... It's a law which is approved of by Singapore's inhabitants and which allows us to reduce the drug problem."[143]
In October 2020, Law Minister K. Shanmugam emphasised that the death penalty is a powerful deterrent to capital crimes in Singapore. He cited the statistics of the rate of firearms-related offences and kidnapping cases had dropped dramatically after the introduction of the death penalty as evidence of its deterrence. Shanmugam also cited that after the government mandates the death penalty since 1991, the average net amount of opium trafficked dropped by 66% and many drug traffickers are illegally transporting less and less amounts of drugs to avoid the punishment. The government conducted surveys on Singaporeans and non-Singaporeans, and the majority of both groups responded that the death penalty is more effective than life imprisonment in discouraging people from committing capital offences.[144]
During a June 2022 BBC interview, Shanmugam, who was asked by the host and journalist Stephen Sackur regarding the death penalty for drugs, stated that the death penalty in Singapore was the right punishment adopted by the government to protect Singaporeans and save lives. He also cited a 2021 report by the World Health Organisation that showed there were 500,000 deaths linked to drug abuse in just one year. Shanmugam added that in the 1990s, Singapore was arresting about 6,000 people a year for drugs, but this has now dropped to about 3,000 people a year. He stated that it goes to show how the draconian laws deployed by Singapore on narcotics offences has safeguarded the lives of many locals and maintains a safe society in Singapore.[145] The death penalty response by Shanmugam during the BBC interview was well-received and supported by many members of the public on social media, who also voiced their support for capital punishment for drugs in Singapore.[146]
In light of the execution of Abdul Rahim Shapiee (and his accomplice), Pritam Singh, opposition leader of Parliament and chairman of Workers' Party, wrote to Singapore newspaper Today to express his support for the death penalty for drug crimes in Singapore and the execution of drug traffickers. Singh nonetheless argued that there should be changes made to rectify the shortcomings in determining the extent of one's cooperation with the authorities during investigations before sentencing, citing cases of traffickers receiving death sentences before courts decided they were couriers and could sentence them for life, as well as cases like Abdul Rahim's, who was sentenced to death despite being a courier and having provided substantive assistance. Singh also expressed concern about the need to curb the frequent abuse of court processes by drug traffickers and their lawyers.
The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) revealed that from 2013 to early 2022, certificates of substantive assistance were issued to 82 out of 104 drug traffickers regardless of nationality, while there were 14 out of the remaining 22 sentenced to death and the other eight traffickers sentenced to life imprisonment due to mental illnesses. Another data revealed that 78% of the traffickers were not subjected to capital punishment despite having brought drugs exceeding the capital threshold, as a result of plea bargains to reduce their capital charges or certifications for substantive assistance.[147]
In 2002, Singapore tried to negotiate with Australia for the extradition of a British murder suspect and fugitive Michael McCrea, who was wanted for the double murder of a couple whose corpses were discovered abandoned in a car at Orchard Towers. However, McCrea, who was arrested in Australia, was not extradited as Australia, which abolished the death penalty for all offences by then, was not legally allowed to extradite suspects back to countries where they would face the death sentence. It was only after Singapore gave the Australian government the assurance that McCrea would not be hanged even if he was convicted of murder, which allowed McCrea to be sent back to Singapore for trial. McCrea was eventually convicted of culpable homicide and destroying evidence of a murder case, and sentenced to a total of 24 years in jail.[148] This left an impact and precedent on Singapore's avenues to successfully negotiating for extradition of suspects from countries where the death penalty or caning was not practised, including the extradition of suspected bank robber David James Roach, whom the Singapore government promised would not face caning for robbery.[149] Roach was eventually sent back to Singapore, where he later served five years in prison, and he was pardoned from caning by President Halimah Yacob.[150][151]
In 2012, a number of American elected officials and office-seekers suggested that Singapore's success in combating drug abuse should be examined as a model for the United States. Michael Bloomberg, a former Mayor of New York City, said that the United States could learn a thing or two from nations like Singapore when it came to drug trafficking, noting that "executing a handful of people saves thousands and thousands of lives."[152] The last execution in New York took place in 1963. Several courts have ruled that the death penalty violates the New York Constitution (see People v. LaValle). In 2007, the state of New York abolished the death penalty. The death penalty has been abolished in 23 states, as well as in Washington D.C., with the most recent being Virginia in 2021. However, certain states, such as Texas and Georgia, still regularly execute prisoners for aggravated murder.
Former presidential candidate Newt Gingrich repeated his longstanding advocacy for Singaporean methods in the United States' War on Drugs during campaign interviews and speeches.[153]
The following table of executions was compiled by Amnesty International from several sources, including statistics supplied by the Ministry of Home Affairs in January 2001 and government figures reported to Agence France-Presse in September 2003.[17] Numbers in curly brackets are the number of foreign citizens executed, according to information disclosed by the Ministry of Home Affairs.
| Year | Murder | Drug-related | Firearms | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1991 | 1 | 5 | 0 | 6[154] |
| 1992 | 13 | 7 | 1 | 21[154] |
| 1993 | 5 | 2 | 0 | 7[154] |
| 1994 | 21 | 54 | 1 | 76[154] |
| 1995 | 20 | 52 | 1 | 73[154] |
| 1996 | 10 {7} | 40 {10} | 0 | 50[154] |
| 1997 | {3} | 11 {2} | 1 | 15[154] |
| 1998 | 4 {1} | 24 {5} | 0 | 28[154] |
| 1999 | 8 {2} | 35 {7} | 0 | 43[154] |
| 2000 | 4 {2} | 17 {5} | 0 | 21[154] |
| 2001 | 4 | 22 | 1 | 27[154] |
| 2002 | 5 | 23 | 0 | 28[154] |
| 2003 | 5 | 14 | 0 | 19[154] |
| 2004 | 4 | 3 | 1 | 8{2}[155][154] |
| 2005 | 2 | 6 | 0 | 8{1}[155][154] |
| 2006 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 8{2}[155][154] |
| 2007 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 3{2}[155][154] |
| 2008 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 6{3}[156] |
| 2009 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 5{2}[156] |
| 2010 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0[156] |
| 2011 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 4[157][154] |
| 2012 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0[158] |
| 2013 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0[158] |
| 2014 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 2[158] |
| 2015 | 1 | 3 | 0 | 4[159] |
| 2016 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 4[160] |
| 2017 | 0 | 8 | 0 | 8[76] |
| 2018 | 2 | 11 | 0 | 13[161] |
| 2019 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 4[162] |
| 2020 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2021 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2022 | 0 | 11 | 0 | 11[163] |
| 2023 | 0 | 5 | 0 | 5[164] |
| 2024 | 1 | 4 | 0 | 5[165][166][167] |
Detailed statistics were not released by the Singapore government between 2000 and 2006. Singapore's Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong told the BBC in September 2003 that he believed there were "in the region of about 70 to 80" hangings in 2003. Two days later he retracted his statement, saying the number was in fact ten.[168] In total, at the end of 2003, 19 people were hanged.[154]
While no information is issued on the race and ethnicity of death row inmates, it was noted in 2021, during an appeal from a number of Malay death row inmates who alleged racism on the part of the government, that there were a large number of Malays among those on death row, with only handfuls of other minority races. Between 2010 and 2021, Malays made up 66 of the 120 prosecuted for capital drug offences, with 76% of cases concluding with the death sentence. 50 out of 77 people sentenced to death between 2010 and 2021 were Malays, with a remaining 15 Indians, 10 Chinese and two from other races.[169] Since 2010, of all the 77 sentenced to death, there were 14 Malaysians being condemned to death row, with eleven of them ethnic Indians, two Malays and one Chinese.[170]
Former chief executioner, Darshan Singh, who died from COVID-19 complications on 31 October 2021,[171] stated that he had executed more than 850 people during his service, which began in 1959. When conducting the executions, he would use the phrase: "I am going to send you to a better place than this. God bless you." At one point, Singh executed 18 people on one day; these 18 people were among the 58 rioters who killed four prison officers while they were serving their jail terms in a Pulau Senang island prison in 1963. Singh also said that he has hanged seven people within 90 minutes; these seven men were the culprits of the 1971 Gold Bars triple murders, in which a businessman and illegal gold trader was killed together with his driver and colleague over a total of 120 gold bars.[172]
Executions peaked between 1994 and 1998; Singapore had the second highest per-capita execution rate in the world during this period, estimated by the United Nations to be 13.83 executions annually per one million people,[173] just behind Turkmenistan with 14.92. Since then, executions have become far less common, with some years having no executions at all. For example, no one was executed in 2012 and 2013, and two persons were executed in 2014. Nevertheless, in the late 2010s, the number of executions has started to increase again: in 2018, 13 people were executed, the most since at least 2003.[174] and four people (including two unreported executions) were hanged in 2019. No one has been executed from the start of 2020 to August 2020, due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Singapore. The first person to be sentenced to death during the COVID-19 pandemic in Singapore was Punithan Genasan, a 37-year-old Malaysian who was also the first to be sentenced to death on 15 May 2020 via a remote court hearing on Zoom.[175] Punithan, who was convicted of drug trafficking, was later acquitted on 31 October 2022 upon appeal.[176] The first fully virtual court hearing of a capital case was made via Zoom on 23 April 2020, when the Court of Appeal acquitted 27-year-old Singaporean drug suspect Mohammad Azli Mohammad Salleh and dismissed both his drug charge and his death sentence.[177][178]
There were originally two executions scheduled for drug traffickers Syed Suhail bin Syed Zin and Mohd Fadzir bin Mustaffa on 18 September 2020 and 24 September 2020 respectively, but they were subsequently postponed due to stays of execution granted pending last-minute appeals against the death sentences.[179][180] As a result, there was no one executed in 2020. Similarly between January and October 2021, no new execution dates were set for the inmates on Singapore's death row, due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and resurgence of community cases.
The execution of Nagaenthran K. Dharmalingam was supposed to be carried out on 10 November 2021,[60] but it was postponed due to Nagaenthran contracting COVID-19. The suspension of Nagaenthran's execution in 2021 also led to no executions being carried out in 2021 itself.[62] There were originally two executions of Roslan Bakar and Pausi Jefridin to be carried out on 16 February 2022 and a third execution of Rosman Abdullah on 23 February 2022 before they were postponed due to the men's appeals.[181][182][183] Due to the increasing notices of executions being revealed publicly, there were lingering concerns from civil groups and international figures that Singapore might resume executions to accommodate the growing death row inmate population at Changi Prison.[184]
The first death row prisoner to be hanged in Singapore during the COVID-19 pandemic was 68-year-old Singaporean drug offender Abdul Kahar Othman on 30 March 2022, who had not appealed against his sentence and later executed as scheduled, therefore resuming executions in Singapore.[184] By the time Abdul Kahar was executed, there were 62 prisoners on death row, awaiting execution (reduced to 61 with Nagaenthran's execution).[185] Nagaenthran K. Dharmalingam was the second to be hanged on 27 April 2022 after Abdul Kahar.[63] Datchinamurthy Kataiah was originally the third in line to be executed on 29 April 2022 after Nagaenthran before his execution was postponed due to an appeal.[186] On 7 July 2022, Kalwant Singh Jogindar Singh and Norasharee Gous became the third and fourth convicts to be hanged in Singapore in 2022.[187][188] In the same month, Nazeri Lajim was executed 15 days after Kalwant and Norasharee.[189] Three more hangings - one on 26 July and two (Malaysian Rahmat Karimon and his accomplice Zainal Hamad) on 2 August - were conducted after Nazeri's execution.[190][191][192] On 5 August 2022, 45-year-old Singaporean Abdul Rahim Shapiee and his 49-year-old accomplice Ong Seow Ping were the ninth and tenth to be executed.[193][194] A 55-year-old Singaporean, whose name is unknown, was the eleventh to be executed for a drug charge on 7 October 2022.[195] In total, eleven executions took place in the year 2022.[196]
In 2023, the first execution was carried out on 26 April 2023, when a 46-year-old Singaporean Tangaraju Suppiah, who was convicted in 2018 of marijuana trafficking, was hanged at dawn.[197][198] On 16 May 2023, three weeks after Tangaraju was put to death, 37-year-old Muhammad Faizal Mohd Shariff, a Singaporean who was found guilty in 2019 of trafficking 1.5 kg of marijuana was reported to have lost his final appeal to commute his sentence.[199][200][201] A day after losing his appeal, Muhammad Faizal was hanged at dawn on 17 May 2023, with the authorities confirming his execution despite not naming Muhammad Faizal out of consideration for his family's need for privacy.[202][203] Two executions of a 56-year-old man and 45-year-old woman (both convicted of drug offences) were scheduled to take place on 26 July and 28 July 2023 respectively;[204] the female offender Saridewi Djamani was believed to be the first woman to be executed in 20 years, as the last known execution of a woman took place on 19 March 2004, when 37-year-old Yen May Woen was put to death for diamorphine trafficking.[205] The 56-year-old male drug offender Mohd Aziz Hussain, as well as Saridewi, were both hanged as scheduled, becoming the third and fourth persons respectively to be executed in Singapore in the year of 2023.[206][207][208] On 3 August 2023, Singapore carried out the hanging of Mohamed Shalleh Abdul Latiff, a 39-year-old Singaporean and former delivery driver found guilty of trafficking 54.04g of diamorphine in 2016.[209]
Ahmed Salim, who was found guilty of the murder of his former fiancée, was the first criminal hanged in Singapore in 2024. Prior to Ahmed's execution on 28 February 2024, the last judicial hanging for murder was carried out in 2019.[210]
The people on death row include foreign nationals, many of whom were convicted of drug-related offences. These inmates come from a diverse range of countries, including the United States[citation needed], Australia, Bangladesh, China, Ghana, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Netherlands, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines, Portugal, Sri Lanka, Thailand, the United Kingdom, and Vietnam. Figures released by the Singapore government show that between 1993 and 2003, 36% of those executed were foreigners, including some residents in Singapore (half of Singapore residents are foreigners).[211]
In 2016, Singaporean director Boo Junfeng directed and released a film titled Apprentice, starring Firdaus Rahman and Wan Hanafi Su. The film, which narrates the fictional story of newly appointed prison officer and executioner Aiman Yusof, touched on the subject of the death penalty in Singapore and an executioner's perspective of the practice, as well as the experiences and ostracisation of the families when their loved ones were tried and executed. The director also revealed that he had gathered information through interviews of the retired executioners, imams and priests who counselled the death row inmates, and also the families of the executed prisoners while producing the film. The film, which was released in several international film festivals, was met with positive public responses and it attracted both nominations and awards for the director and production team.[403][404][405][406]
In Singapore, there were local crime shows like In Cold Blood, Crimewatch, and True Files which re-enact the real-life crimes in Singapore. Among these cases, there were murder and drug trafficking cases which attract the death penalty in the city-state. Often, the re-enactments of these capital cases would also show the final verdicts of the convicts, where it revealed the dates of their sentencing and/or executions. Notably, executed criminals like English serial killer John Martin Scripps,[407] child killer Adrian Lim,[408] notorious wife-killer Anthony Ler[409][410] and cop-killer Zainal Abidin Abdul Malik featured in these re-enactment shows since the 1980s till the present.[411]
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