Complicity in the senseless murder of a young boy
Saturday, 27 January 2007, 3:54 pm |
By Zyberzitizen
Iwuchukwu Amara Tochi.
Will we remember him – or even his name? Will it matter to us? Does it matter to us? Why should we care about a Nigerian who is convicted of trafficking drugs? Why should we care about him who is now dead – sentenced to die and hung by our esteemed courts of well-trained, experienced judges?
Indeed, why care at all when he is not the only or first person to die by the noose for drugs trafficking?
Why?
Because we are complicit in his death.
Who are ‘we’?
The government , the elected MPs, the media, the courts, the local lawyers who kept quiet, the opposition parties who kept quiet, the public who kept quiet.
The society which turned a blind eye.
Yes, we.
The points of the case has been well articulated by some bloggers, especially Alex Au or Yawning Bread as he is popularly known (here and here). Thus, I will not go into that. I would, however, like to focus on the way our whole society turned a blind eye – and how easy it was for us to do so.
And yes, we are guilty of complicity in the death of this young man.
The government:
So many ministers, so many MPs – both of the ruling party and the opposition. Yet, as far as I know, not a single one of them raised this issue/case in parliament. Not that they did not have a chance to. Indeed, they were all in parliament just days before the execution of Tochi took place.
There are many lawyers among the MPs, yet not a single one found it necessary to question the doubts raised by the case of this Nigerian boy.
Perhaps the thought is that once Tochi is executed, people will forget about it soon enough. Or perhaps, that Tochi is from a country which is insignificant to Singapore economically and politically.
Or even perhaps our MPs feel that our courts are so absolutely perfect that there is no need to question but only trust. Indeed, the government has trumpeted the standing of the Singapore judicial system by citing certain international reports and ratings.
When the government itself has publicly and proudly declared that we should strive to be a ‘compassionate society’, but none of the MPs in government finds it necessary to raise the case of Tochi, I find the words ‘compassionate society’ hollow, empty and yes, even hypocritical.
The media
No one is more complicit in the death of this young boy than the Singapore mass media. This is my opinion.
The mass media reaches the masses, that’s why it’s called the ‘mass media’. Thus, it is through the mass media that issues can be raised effectively and generate discussions, debates, even heated ones. This is how alternative views are opened up, orthodox ones questioned, new ideas flow and society progresses.
Yet, in a case such as Tochi’s, the mass media was woefully silent, quiet, nonchalant. Seems to me that the taking of a life deserves nothing more than a blip on their radar screen, if indeed there was even a blip.
Valid, probing questions were raised by Alex Au and particularly the Singapore Democratic Party. Yet, the media must have deemed these questions insignificant. They would rather pick up the Wee Shu Min issue rather than question the law or the application of the law in this case. They would rather devote pages upon pages to useless, inane, senseless, completely irrelevant topics than to ask substantial questions about this case.
When a judge says there is no proof that an accused knows he was carrying drugs, but yet sentence the same accused to death, a responsible media will pick it up and asks questions.
Yet, our media elected to adopt deafening silence.
The courts
How does a judge go to sleep knowing full well that he is complicit in the death of a young boy whom the judge himself pronounce publicly that there is doubt about his knowledge that what he was carrying was drugs?
This, perhaps, is the lingering question that is in the minds of many who read about the case.
Local Lawyers
Woefullt inept, completely cowed, pathetically irresponsible. I apologise for these harsh words but they are my true feelings.
These are the people who are in the business of seeking justice, fairness and sense. Indeed, they can be termed ‘the conscience of society’, a noble profession. But what we have just seen is nothing conscionable, nothing noble.
On the contrary, what we’ve seen from our local lawyers, particularly the Law Society, is shameful avoidance. Convenient shrug of the shoulders, as it were.
Surely, if even a layman can see the inconsistency and the unfairness (to say the least) of the sentence, an expert who is trained in the law for years can see it too?
What made our lawyers turn a blind eye to Tochi?
The opposition parties
So very often we have heard opposition parties declare themselves wanting to be the ‘check and balance’ to the government. So, where were they in this case of potential miscarriage of justice?
Where was the ‘check’ on the courts of government and the ‘balance’ brought to a senseless sentence?
I am particularly disappointed with the opposition parties. Perhaps they feel such a case is irrelevant to Singaporeans (and thus, will not win them any votes – especially when it involves the taboo subject of drug trafficking), or they preferred to bury their heads in the sand and pretend that it will go away soon enough.
Check and balance means check and balance in matters which matter. And if how a young boy is put to death does not matter to the opposition, then perhaps the opposition should quit talking about being a ‘check and balance’ to the government. For in not exercising what they preach, they are not less complicit than those whom they oppose.
*Appreciation goes to the Singapore Democratic Party for being the only opposition party which consistently and regularly posted updates about Tochi’s case on their website.
The public who kept quiet
I would like to qualify my criticism of the public by saying that they are only partly responsible – because of the mass media which, as explained, kept the news from them.
But even so, those of us who knew about the case did not do enough. Some of us attended the vigil for Tochi and were there in the early morning of Jan 26 when they tied a noose around his neck and dropped him through the trapdoor, sending him to his death.
We could have done more – much more.
Conclusion
This is a very very solemn time for me personally. Sad, for sure. But more than sad, it is disturbing, disconcerting and even frightening.
It is frightening to know how callously our state metes out the death sentence. How cavalier the attitude afterwards. “We must protect society”, says the prime minister after the death.
But who protects the innocent abused by the state?
Not the elected MPs, not the opposition parties, not the courts, not the lawyers, not the public and certainly not the mass media.
That much has been determined by this case.
Complicity only requires a turning of a blind eye. A shrug of the shoulders. A nonchalant attitude.
And make no mistake, we are guilty.
Thus, in sentencing Tochi to his death, we have sentenced ourselves to a lower level among civilized societies.
Without compassion, that is what we are – uncivilized – no matter the glamourous and glitzy trappings we see all around us.
Welcome to “First World Singapore”.
Disneyland with the death penalty – senselessly meted out.
Where a nation turned a blind eye.
Even to the sanctity of life.
——————
Read an account of Tochi’s journey from Africa to Singapore here.
The series of events leading to Tochi’s execution here.
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My heartfelt thank you to zyberzitizen for writing this piece. What you wrote pretty much reflected what I feel. I couldn’t have done a better job at it.
My heartfelt thanks also to TOC for posting it on their blog as well as for the other post “Bloggers question tochi’s execution”.
Regards, article19 aka Pseudonymity
Your wonderful article is very helpful to all of us, the drug dealers who need to find people to carry our dope to kids around the world.
I know the people of Singapore live in peace, have a low crime rate and no serious drug problem. Could that have anything to do with the fact that they come down hard on drugs? Naaaaahh… right?
I mean, serious, have YOU ever met a heroin addict? Have YOU ever seen a family destroyed by that stuff? I guess not. You’re much too busy thinking up ways to blame everyone else.
Listen, all us traffickers hope that people like you keep trying to reduce the punishment for drugs. I know the Singapore courts, the Singapore media, the Singapore legal community, Singapore families and ALL Singaporeans think that they have to come down hard on drugs in order to protect their society. Thank God you know better. I’m dying to have more from your wisdom.
Dear William,
I think what you have said is grossly unfair to zyberzitizen and those who have spoken out or written about it.
I believe all of us know about drug abuse and those who traffick in them. Those who traffick in drugs need to be punished.
But you, and many like you, seem to miss the point: The possibility of miscarriage of justice in cases which has the mandatory death penalty as its ultimate punishment. In such cases, when the death penalty is carried out, it cannot be undone.
If totally getting rid of the death penalty in Singapore is too much for certain quarters, at least the law should be changed so that its not mandatory. Thus freeing up the judges to determine the appropriate sentence based on each case. This first step is at least a start instead of the routine business of state sponsored murder.
I would like to present here excerpts from a recent statement by Philip Alston, the UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions of the United Nations Human Rights Council:
“It is a fundamental human right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty,” Alston said. “The standard accepted by the international community is that capital punishment may be imposed only when the guilt of the person charged is based upon clear and convincing evidence leaving no room for an alternative explanation of the facts.”
“Singapore cannot reverse the burden and require a defendant to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he didn’t know that he was carrying drugs,” Alston said.
The trial judge appears to have accepted that Mr Tochi might not have realized that the capsules he was carrying contained heroin, stating that “[t]here was no direct evidence that he knew the capsules contained diamorphine, or that he had found that out on his own” but that “ignorance did not exculpate him”. He was convicted and sentenced to death.
The appeal court rejected the trial court’s suggestion that it was irrelevant whether Mr Tochi had knowledge of what he was carrying. Nevertheless, it upheld his conviction.
“In the case of Iwuchukwu Amara Tochi, the Government of Singapore has failed to ensure respect for the relevant legal safeguards. Under the circumstances, the execution should not proceed.”
“Singapore’s decision to make the death penalty mandatory keeps judges from considering all of the factors relevant to determining whether a death sentence would be permissible in a capital case,” Alston said.
Dear Article19
I think what you have said is grossly unfair to me and the millions of Singaporeans who are in favour of the system.
Please don’t bother quoting some foreigner telling us what to do in our country, and his opinion on what is fair and not fair. That foreigner, and other foreigners, are not the people who have a stake here. Singaporeans have a stake here and they have a right to decide on what punishments to give.
That is why this little blog makes me laugh so much. The blogger is basically blaming everyone for “complicity”. Get real. Everyone is just fine with what happened. That is the truth. It is only the blogger and you who think that you know something that the rest of Singapore doesn’t.
If you are not in favour of the death penalty, then where was your protest when Took Leng How was sentenced and hanged?
If you are in favour of the death penalty, but just think that it should not be mandatory, or that it was wrongly applied in this case, then that’s a different story. So please make up your mind: are you against the death penalty in principle (which is what your post suggests, and what the vast majority of Singaporeans and people are in favour of) or are you just not happy with this particular drug case?
And if you really are interested in what the trial judge said, and what the appeal court said, then read the grounds of decision. Both judgments are public documents and have been quoted out of context by a few bloggers (who all sound suspiciously the same). Forget the stories about how this poor Nigerian liked to play football and had a mother who loved him. That’s just confusing the issue and appealing to sentiment. Use some logic and statistics. The only statistics that matter are that Singapore is relatively drug-free, and Singaporeans are satisfied with the system. Please don’t quote any more unknown foreigners with long self-created titles from the UN.
So “the possibility of miscarriage of justice in cases which has the mandatory death penalty as its ultimate punishment” doesn’t bother you, not only for such cases but in general?
Dear William,
You said: “millions of Singaporeans who are in favour of the system.”
How do you know that - especially when the local mainstream media gave it only scant attention?
Do these ‘millions of singaporeans’ know about the case, in the first place? And if they don’t, how are they ‘in favour of the system’?
Singaporeans may have voted for the PAP but that does not mean they ‘are in favour’ of any one specific policy or all policies.
Example, there are those who voted for the PAP and their policies in general but are against some policies in particular. It is not blanket approval, although granted that elections only brings up a few issues, and not all issues.
The problem is that claims of the death penalty is not supported conclusively or even convincingly. In fact, there is no study whatsoever in singapore on this claim.
On the other hand, other countries and international organisations have studied it and the consensus is that, at the very least, there is no substantiation or conclusive proof that the death penalty deters criminals.
What some studies have shown, on the other hand, is that the death penalty is not a deterrent - as in this report by Amnesty International.
I apologise for citing a foreign report but this is because there are no such studies or reports from singapore. If you should know of any such reports done locally, please do share it with us.
And lastly, you seem to have ignored the trial judge, the very same judge who convicted Tochi, saying that he (the judge) “accepted that he might not have realised that the substance he was carrying was heroin”.
If even the judge admitted, accepted and recognised that Tochi may not even have known what he was carrying was heroin, how then do you convict him of trafficking?
Can you traffick something you do not know exist?
Regards,
Zz
i was wondering why there was much more attention accorded to shanmugam and nguyen, but almost non-existent for tochi.
i received word that the singapore anti-death penalty campaign apparently declined to pursue tochi’s case.
and zyberzitizen, i belive the judge found tochi guilty still despite acknowledging his lack of knowledge because he believed tochi’s suspicions should have been raised when offered a substantial sum of money to courier the package. which does not make the punishment any more right, nevertheless.
To William -
You requested that people stop quoting foreigners. Of course! Because foreigners are stupid and we don’t need them. We live on an island and get by just fine without them. Any job that could be done by a foreigner could be done by a Singaporean a lot better. And our country is better than all the others. We are drug free and safe because of the mandatory hangings. Denmark is drug free and safe because of something else I guess. Because they manage to do it without the death penalty. How can they do that if they are such dumb foreigners cannot teach us anything? Quite obviously the stupid foreigners just don’t realize that killing all these people in Singapore is the ONLY way to achieve safety and drug-free society, except for their own method. If they have a non-death way, then it’s just not going to be as good as ours. Because we are the best. Singapore is the best. At everything. And just let’s kick out all the stupid foreigners who don’t know anything and we Singaporeans can sit here on our island and gloat about are safety and boast about our highest execution rate in the world. I do, in fact, take every opportunity I can to inform foreigners of our love of hanging foreigners. Maybe they won’t come here. I hope they don’t.
Teck Soon
Dear zyberzitizen
If you have a choice between quoting a Singaporean view, and a foreigner’s view, why choose the latter?
Why ignore what the Singapore trial judge and the Singapore Court of Appeal said, in favour of what ONE foreigner said? Is it because you don’t happen to agree with the Singaporeans?
And do quote the trial judge and the court of appeal in full. The trial judge’s point was that even if the accused said that he did not know for a fact that what he was carrying was heroin, that excuse just won’t wash. It’s so easy for drug traffickers to say that they were paid to carry to another country, and they know what the packet looks like and how it weighs, but they did not know for a fact that it was heroin. Because, you know, it could have been sugar, right? Or flour? Get real. Read the entire grounds of decision.
Frankly, I love it that you guys keep side-stepping the issue. Are you against the death penalty in principle, or just in this particular case?
If you are against the death penalty in principle, then what deterrent do you offer in return? Life sentence for this boy? The mandatory death penalty message is the one clear message that the drug traffickers understand.
Teck Soon makes me laugh. Denmark is drug-free? Have you ever been to Denmark? Try looking at some facts for a change. 65% of the Danish public recently said that they are concerned about the drug problem in their country. The culture is not what you believe, Teck Soon.
And by the way, while we are on the subject of facts, please don’t distort them by claiming that Singapore has the highest execution rate in the world. That is something put out by the SDP (of course they are always so truthful and objective and they have no agenda right). The fact is that the Singapore rate of execution is lower than that of our neighbours, and that of the United States.
Now, if you want a proper debate, then go for the facts. Not emotion and sentiment.
By the way, not too many protests when Took Leng How was hanged right? No one talking about “state-sponsored murder”? Seems like double standards.
Well, let me take the Netherlands as a case: it has legalized a great number of drugs and they have reduced the drug problem by removing the problem part. Drugs are bad, alcohol is bad, cigarettes are bad, but people who take them, take them because they choose so. We can and should tell them the risks and the consequences. But if we decriminalize them, the market value of drugs declines and their is less need to pay top dollars to secret couriers.
Countries like Myanmar, North Korea, etc. draw a great deal of their profit out of the drug trade. The Singapore government has only executed the little drug couriers but never caught the big guy behind these operations. There has been no action against the drug lords, not even a public statement. This is a war against small fish, of which we know there are thousands.
I mourn for Tochi, Ngyuen, etc. because they were young and gullible. They were people that could have been saved and reformed. The execution of these people just is a waste. I fully agree with Zyberzitizen!
[...] Complicity in the senseless murder of a young boy Posted by H-SPHERE on January 27th, 2007 By Zyberzitizen Iwuchukwu Amara Tochi. Will we remember him – or even his name? Will it matter to us? Does it matter to us? Why should we care about a Nigerian who is convicted of trafficking drugs? Why should we care about him who is now dead – sentenced to die and hung by our esteemed courts of well-trained, experienced judges? Indeed, why care at all when he is not the only or first person to die by the noose for drugs trafficking? [...]
Dear Steve
You say “if we decriminalise them, then the market value of drugs declines” and that will fight drugs.
At least you are attempting to make a logical point. The problem with what you say is that the drugs which Tochi was carrying are NOT legal, even in the Netherlands. It was heroin. Such drugs are ‘hard’ drugs and are universally recognised as being extremely dangerous. You will not find any society which will decriminalise heroin. So your suggestion really doesn’t work here.
Second, it’s not true that Singapore executes only the small fish. What’s conveniently forgotten is that there were two people executed that day. The first was Tochi. Guess who was the other person? 35-year-old Okeke Nelson Malachy. Yes, the “big fish” who ordered the drugs. Now, we don’t hear any complaint about him, right? Because everyone can see that Nelson deserved it. Is it a case of double standards?
Third, you say that Tochi was young and gullible. I can accept that he is young (21 years old), but I don’t know why you say he is gullible. Just because someone is young, he should be treated differently? Is that really justice? All that will happen is that the drug lords will ask younger couriers to do the work.
Let’s face it, there is no easy and nice way to fight drugs. We have to send a clear message and that message is that everyone who trafficks in heroin gets the mandatory death penalty. Otherwise everyone who gets caught will say “I’m young”, “I am just the small fish”, “save me and reform me please”, etc.
Anyway, if you really want to think about young and gullible people and mourn for them, spare a thought for the real victims: the young and gullible kids in Singapore who become drug addicts. What do you say to them and to their families? Spare a thought for the rest of society who has to clean up the messes that people like Tochi, Nguyen and Nelson bring over. I’ve asked for an alternative plan, and so far no one has even dared to suggest one.
Of course I agree that we should educate the young and tell everyone about the risks, etc. I think that much more has to be done. But that’s a problem world wide, not just in Singapore. And it’s a false dichotomy to suggest that if we rely on education, we can do away with the death penalty for heroin trafficking. We have to do both.
(As for Teck Soon’s Denmark example, I am not surprised that he has dropped it since it suddenly doesn’t support his view at all. It’s easy to make an argument until you have to deal with facts and logic.)
No one else wants to dispute the fact that the myth about Singapore having the highest execution rate is unsubstantiated? Anyway, Amnesty International themselves say otherwise:
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0405-07.htm
China Leads Death List as Number of Executions Around the World Soars
by Anne Penketh, Diplomatic Editor
Executions around the world are nearing record levels, and the Unites States is among the four countries which account for 97 per cent of the total, a report has found.
At least 3,797 people were executed in 25 countries in 2004, according to a report released today by Amnesty International.
The report says China easily operates the most stringent capital punishment regime, with an estimated 3,400 executions last year. In second place, Iran executed at least 159, Vietnam at least 64, and 59 prisoners were put to death in the US.
MOST EXECUTIONS
Total in 2004
1 China 3,400*
2 Iran 159*
3 Vietnam 64*
4 United States 59*
5 Saudi Arabia 33*
If you are interested in the figure for Singapore, it is 6. Like I said, people have to use facts if they want to make a convincing argument.
Does waging war on drugs necessarily mean that it is necessarily to execute people who possess drugs? Does the war on drugs justify the presumption that carrying than 15 grams is trafficking? Does the war on drugs mean that supply of drugs is the problem, rather than the demand for drugs?
Of course, it is natural to blame the problem on the supply of drugs because it’s easier to deal with the problem through executing people who carry drugs (whether they are innocent or not) than to deal with the problem through understanding why people are turning to drugs.
Dear Aaron
Like I said earlier, it is so easy for people to criticise rather than to come up with solutions. I haven’t heard any so far, only a lot of moaning.
To answer your first question, NO. Waging war on drugs does not mean it is necessary to execute people who possess drugs. And I never said that, so be honest when you make an argument. It is necessary to execute drug TRAFFICKERS.
Does the war on drugs justify the presumption that carrying 15 grams is trafficking? Of course. Listen, Singapore is not the only country that uses presumptions. Guess where we adopted it from? England. Presumptions are a fundamental part of Western jurisprudence. Of course, not everyone agrees about it. There is hardly anything that anyone agrees on absolutely. But Singapore is not a rogue state just because it has presumptions.
You ask whether the supply of drugs is the problem, rather than the demand. Please don’t use false dichotomies. The supply of drugs and the demand of drugs are both part of the problem. That is exactly why I said, so why try to misquote me? Read what I said. We have to do both. Do you mean to say the supply of drugs is NOT the problem?
And I certainly don’t agree that we should execute innocent people. But that’s the fundamental problem right? You think he’s innocent, and I (and the trial judge who heard him, and the Court of Appeal who heard the appeal) don’t agree with you.
Please don’t confuse the issues. If you are against capital punishment, then say so. Then explain why there is no outcry when Took Leng How was hanged. If you against the application of capital punishment in this particular case then say so. We can talk about this particular case. We can argue whether he is or is not guilty. But don’t confuse the two issues.
And please, for goodness sake, don’t ever reduce any argument into “either-or”. We must tackle the supply AND the demand, and if you bother to read what I wrote, and argue logically, you will save a lot of time for people who are interested in a serious discussion, and not emotion.
By the way Aaron, please don’t forget you owe me a solution. You don’t like capital punishment. You know what? I don’t like it too. It is a terrible thing. But we are dealing with a terrible problem. You want to get rid of capital punishment for drug traffickers? I will be the first one to support you. But please, take a stand and propose an alternative. Until then, plesae go easy on criticising. Any idiot can criticise anything, especially when talking about a complex problem.
Dear William,
Your claim that China is the state with the highest execution rate in the world is only partly correct. This is because you are looking at absolute numbers - some 3,400 executions in the year you cited, which is 2004.
Singapore is the state with the highest rate of execution per capita. And this rate is three times higher than the second placed country, Saudi Arabia - according to this Amnesty report.
You can also confirm this with these reports:
Singapore has the highest execution rate in the world relative to its population
Singapore, with a population of just over four million, is believed to have the highest per capita execution rate in the world.
Singapore has the world’s highest per capita execution rate
As such, it is not quite fair to see it in absolute numbers - as other countries have much higher population compared to Singapore. Thus, it is reasonable to say that with much higher populations, these countries would have a higher execution rate in absolute numbers.
Hence, it is more accurate to use the per capita rate. And in this, there is consensus among researchers and reports that Singapore has indeed the highest execution rate in the world - per capita.
I hope that clears things up.
You asked: “If you have a choice between quoting a Singaporean view, and a foreigner’s view, why choose the latter?”
Why do I have to choose, in the first place? Why would I not take both into account? But to answer your point, I quoted the trial judge himself, a singaporean. So, I am not sure what you are saying.
As I said before, if you have reports of studies done by singapore on our death penalty, please let us know and I will be more than happy to take a look. If you do not, then please do not fault me in using other well-researched studies from other countries.
You said: “The trial judge’s point was that even if the accused said that he did not know for a fact that what he was carrying was heroin, that excuse just won’t wash.”
You are not quite right here. Even though Tochi said he did not know what he was carrying was drugs, I am not using his words as defence. On the contrary, I am using the words of the trial judge himself who said that there was no proof to show that Tochi knew what he was carrying was drugs or that there was any proof that he had found that out by himself.
Remember that the burden of proof in this case (as in all drug trafficking cases) is on the accused. He had to prove that he wasn’t trafficking.
Thus, if even the trial judge acknowledged, recognised and accepted that he did not even know what he was carrying was drug, how then do you convict hiim of trafficking?
Remember again that it is the trail judge who said all this after at the close of the trial. It wasn’t just Tochi’s claims.
The trial judge agreed with Tochi.
But yet sentenced him to death.
This is what upsets me - and others.
As for your question whether I am against the death penalty, on principle I am not - but I would like to see that the application of capital punishment, the procedure engaged in its application, and certain police procedures be corrected before I would give it my whole support.
Having said that, I am against the death penalty for drug trafficking in particular.
Please note that my saying I am not against capital punishment is on principle, not on particular crimes.
This is just my personal view.
Regards,
zz
Dear ZZ
Now the numbers are obviously incorrect. You have cited one Amnesty article which has numbers from 1994 to 1999. And then you have cited 3 articles, but if you read them, each of them cite the same Amnesty article you cited in the first place. That Amnesty article is long superceded by Amnesty’s own article which I have quoted to show that there were 6 executions in 2004. Your source is long outdated.
Six executions. Even on a per capita basis, there is NO WAY you can argue that our rate is the highest. It is not the highest at all, even per capita. Do the maths. China is 2.83 per million, USA is 2.36 per million. Singapore is a long, long way from that, not even half.
The fact is that when Teck Soon claimed that Singapore has the highest execution rate in the world, that statement is false. Teck Soon had no source and no basis to say that, and I suspect that he was simply mouthing off some outdated propaganda that he heard from somewhere else. Facts count.
Now, I turn to your second point. You may be surprised to know I happen to agree with you. The application and procedure for capital offences cases are not perfect. And even if they are perfect, we must not be complacent and we must keep reviewing them. So the discussion is important, even if we do not agree.
Where we don’t agree is this: I think that in drug cases it is especially effective to use capital punishment. Drug trafficking is a matter of economics. The drug dealer weighs risk and benefit. If there is a risk of mandatory capital punishment then that will be a difficult risk for him to accept. The drug dealer is less likely to take a risk and move his drugs to Singapore.
Now the third point: Tochi’s case. You have to read what the court said, not just bits which are quoted out of context. Sure, everyone can agree that Tochi did not know that what he was carrying was heroin. His story was that he was carrying magic herbs. Now, before you start thinking that it was leaves or something, let me tell you that the magic herbs were in fact pills, and Tochi knew that. He knew he was carrying pills, because when he was caught, he swallowed one.
Let me put it this way: if someone you don’t know (his name, laughably, was “Mr Smith”) promised you money to carry some pills across the border, you wouldn’t have to know that the pills are heroin, ecstacy or something else. The point is that you knew that you were carrying pills which you are not going to declare to customers, which are worth a lot of money, and which are probably drugs right? Otherwise why would you do it? This seems really obvious to me. I can accept that you may not personally believe him, but let’s face it, it is really very easy for anybody caught carrying something to say that actually, it’s not his, it’s someone else’s, and he didn’t know what it was. But that kind of defence is like the Nuremberg defence. It is like saying, “I didn’t know that there were jews being sent to the concentration camp, no one told me, I was just doing what I was asked to do…” It’s not good enough.
Dear William,
You said: “That Amnesty article is long superceded by Amnesty’s own article which I have quoted to show that there were 6 executions in 2004. Your source is long outdated.”
I am afraid I am not sure what you are saying or referring to. Going back to the articles I quoted, this one by CNN clearly was not referring to the Amnesty Report:
Singapore has the highest execution rate in the world relative to its population, according to the 2005 U.N. report.
As you can see, it refers to a United Nations report. And also, the report is in 2005 - which in fact superceded your quoted report of 2004.
I am afraid that you have got it wrong.
So, it is clear that it was not just Amnesty which reported that singapore has the highest execution rate but also the United Nations.
I am guessing that you did not read the reports I quoted - or else you would not have mistaken them.
Regards,
Zz
ZZ
Not correct. I have read the CNN report, and just to make it very clear to anyone, I will reproduce an excertp:
“In an effort to stop Singapore from becoming a narcotics hub, more than 420 prisoners have been hanged in Singapore since 1991, most of them for drug trafficking, according to Amnesty International. That figure is “shocking,” Amnesty said.
Singapore has the highest execution rate in the world relative to its population, according to the 2005 U.N. report. An average of 6.9 people were executed per 1 million over 1999 to 2003, the report states.”
There are 2 sources for the CNN report, both of which cover an outdated period (i.e. up to 2003). The most recent figures which I cited from Amnesty are from 2004. The Amnesty report is published in 2005 and covers executions in 2004.
And by the way, the actual quote from Amnesty is that
“in 2004 that about 420 people had been hanged in Singapore since 1991, mostly for drug smuggling, giving the country of 4.4 million people “possibly” the highest execution rate in the world relative to its population.”
I have added the emphasis on “possibly” to show you that even Amnesty is not sure about making that statement. But anyway, don’t make me disprove Teck Soon’s point. Since he makes that claim, let HIM back it up. If he has any accurate source, I will accept it. I am interested only in the facts.
William,
Your art-thou-so-high-and-mighty attitude pisses me. You have your cases; so does everyone else. Don’t go around demanding that people owe you an answer because I don’t need to answer you if I choose not to. In anycase, if I choose not to answer you, it’s not because you have the stronger argument, but I dislike dealing with people who think they are always right.
First off the bat, did I explicitly refer to you in my reply? I only asked some questions which I think are relevant things to think about. To be brutally frank, the way you jumped to your own defence so quickly appears to me that you are so egoistical about your argument that you take any reply that is not in line with yours to be an attack on you. I wonder who is the one who’s operating on the dichotomy that non-agreement equates disagreement? Therefore, I will NOT respond to anything that you claim that to be a “misquote” of you.
Regarding presumptions, can you please explain why is it more correct to presume that a person carrying 15 grams of heroin is engaging in trafficking than to presume otherwise? On what kind of basis can we make that presumption? Listen, I never said anything about throwing presumptions out of the window. I am merely questioning the validity of the current presumption.
Next, with regards to the issue of demand and supply, my point was quite simply that the focus seem to be more on dealing with supply, and I stated the basis for my conclusion. I did not attempt a false dichotomy by ruling out one in favour of the other. I only stated that it seems easier to deal with supply rather than demand, but I NEVER stated that demand is the problem and supply isn’t. If you are unsure of what I said, I think you should clarify before jumping the gun.
I have stated on my own blog that I oppose capital punishment in Singapore because it has been applied so mechanically. Even if there are grounds for doubt, there are no means of recourse for the accused. Just today in the papers was a huge coverage of a Singaporean convicted of murder in New Jersey. He could have been given capital punishment since New Jersey has capital punishment laws, but the judge decided against it. If I were living in New Jersey, it is probable that I would support the death penalty because at least there are some restraints to prevent miscarriage of justice. If at least the presumption of guilty unless proven innocent turned the other way round, even though I might not support the death penalty, I will be ambivalent about it.
I’m sorry if you feel offended by my reply but I’m merely reflecting back to you what other people feel when reading your replies. I don’t mind a robust argument, but I dislike the attitude you portray in your replies.
William,
I forgot to state that I was against Took’s hanging for the very same reason that I’m against Tochi’s. I did not blog about it then, although I did discuss with some of the people around me. This time round, I am motivated enough to write about it because I cannot believe it is happening a second time that doubts have been raised but ignored. If you wish to engage in a discussion along this line, I’m happy to oblige. As for other discussions, depending on your reply, I might or might not choose to engage you in a discussion.
Just to contribute a fact that Amnesty International probably didn’t know (or take into account). Something happened in 1990 - CJ Yung Pung How was appointed. One of the man’s major accomplishments was the clearing up of backlog in the courts.
Apparently, there were people who had been on the death row (waiting to be hanged) for more than 10 years in 1990, and the backlog of death row prisoners “was being cleared” in the early 90s. For this reason, if you simply take the number of people executed during the early 90s, you will get a huge jump.
The “backlog” has apparently been cleared up by year 2000 and so in recent years, you wouldn’t see such a high number of executions annually. Today, you will not find a man who is on the death row for more than 2 years (We might have become overly efficient in our administration of executions though). So, William is actually correct to claim that our execution rate isn’t highest in the world. In fact, we’re probably about average.
The KTM has his piece to say about his whole issue, but that’s for another time. For now, he’s just contributing a fact on the execution numbers to help explain the apparent anormaly.
Now I would like to add a moral argument to the debate:
who gives a human the right to kill another human? I am not a Christian but I think Jesus was right when he recommended to turn the other cheek. Thou shalt not kill, sounds like good words to me.
I once was convinced that the death penalty would be the right thing for heinous murder and rape. Today, however, I am not so sure anymore. What if we execute an innocent? What if Tochi said the truth and he didn’t know that these were drugs? Then that was state sanctioned murder!
And that in my humble opinion is immoral!
Dear Steve
Thanks for adding something new to the debate: the moral issue. Like you, I do not wish to bring religion into the picture. Christians themselves are divided about the death penalty, for the same reason that all of us here today are. But if you quote the Bible, you must be accurate. You have quoted two parts. “Thou shalt not kill” is not what the Old Testament says. It says “Thou shalt not murder”. And by the way, the Old Testmanent also advocates the death penalty, as well as a number of other things which I won’t go into. Christ did say that one must turn the other cheek. But if we adopt His example, we would not have any armies to defend ourselves.
Is war an exception to killing? Is self-defence?
Today we are facing a war on drugs and drug traffickers, and we are defending our society against that threat. We are using whatever measures we know of to fight it. If there are better measures, I would be the first to abandon the death penalty. I have asked for good alternatives and so far no one has given any. All they have done is to attack me. It’s easy to criticise and destroy when you do not want to take responsibility for putting forward something positive.
The next problem you highlighted was the possibility of error. Again, a very good point. It is possible that the courts will get it wrong. It is possible that the government will get it wrong. That is a problem about implementation of the idea, and not about the idea itself. So the question really is this: “Assuming I agree in principle with the death penalty, I have concerns that it will not be implemented properly. There will be mistakes.” But my answer to that is if there is any possibility of a mistake, then the system must stop it and acquit the accused. There are three levels of checks: the trial judge, the appeal court and the President (for clemency).
Now, you may very well be cynical and say that the courts are biased and the President will not do anything, but again, that is a problem of implementation. I don’t believe the courts are biased (why should they be? it is not a political matter? who is Tochi or Took Leng How?). They have acquitted people before. If you have a more sceptical view about the courts then you are entitled to it. But it is a problem of implementation. That problem does not mean that the principle of mandatory capital punishment for drug traffickers is wrong. For the record, I don’t think that the court was wrong to sentence Tochi. I don’t think that the court was wrong to sentence Took. I think that some decisions were wrong: I am thinking in particular about the maids who were tried for murder. But that is a discussion for another day.
Killing is a nasty, immoral thing. I agree. But so is drugs. So is rape. So is murder. Fight fire with fire. It’s the only message that works.
To Mr Kuay Teow Man: you are absolutely right. I believe you must be connected to the legal community. Because of the reason you have outlined (backlog in cases now cleared up), I think your prediction that our execution rate is now average will be proven right over the years. I am interested to hear your views on mandatory capital punishment for drug traffickers, as well as for Took. I will look out for your blog.
To Aaron: I am certainly no longer interested in your views. All you have done is to call me names (which I don’t mind) without any logic or facts (which I do mind). Since you made a statement, that Singapore has the highest execution rate, I demand that you justify it. Otherwise, your statement will lack credibility. And that will tend to make the rest of your opinion valueless.
The other thing that is bad about Aaron’s post is dishonesty. He said, “Did I explicitly refer to you in my post?” Just to remind everyone what his post was, he said “Does waging war on drugs necessarily mean that it is necessarily to execute people who possess drugs… Does the war on drugs mean that supply of drugs is the problem, rather than the demand for drugs?” etc. etc.
Now Aaron tell everyone honestly who you were referring to. My post appeared just before yours. Mine is the only one which talks about the war on drugs, and attacking the supply. I have searched the entire page for anyone else who has talked about that topic. No one has. So you were obviously, certainly, definitely, without a doubt referring to me. Have the guts to stand up for your own post. If you are dishonest, it affects the quality of the debate.
Sorry Aaron: My statement that you said that Singapore has the highest execution rate is wrong! It was Teck Soon who said it. Very very sorry for misquoting you.
Dear william,
I take your point anf thank you for clearing it up. Having said that, however, we have to keep in mind that the reason why AI is ‘unsure’ about the exact figure is because executions in singapore are shrouded in mystery, and the mainstream media gives it scant attention, if any.
In the same vein, figures from China are also not exact.
Be that as it may, there is no doubt that singapore’s rate is high. Of course this is open to debate as what constitutes ‘high’ would be a personal opinion or based on certain criterias which could be seen as arbitrary.
Thanks also to KTM for clarifying the rate of execution - even though it would better if KTM could give some substantiation to what he says.
Having said all that, I am still very concerned about the way the death penalty is carried out. If we recall, some of the words of our people in govt are quite troubling.
For example, PM Goh (as he was still PM at that time) said that “I’ve got more important things to worry about.”(BBC HARDtalk interview with Goh Chok Tong, televised on 23 September 2003.) when asked about the death penalty.
And the then chief justice Yong Pung How was reported as having told the lawyer of an accused “You can say he is an innocent man, but as far as the law is concerned, he has been found guilty and convicted. You better say goodbye to him, that’s all you can do.”. (Straits Times, 26 September 2003.)
Such is the cavalier attitude we have at the highest level of government towards the use of the death peanalty.
And there have also been instances where doubts were raised and questions unanswered or issues not debated. Such as this one:
“Rozman Jusoh, a 24-year-old labourer from Malaysia, was arrested allegedly after trying to sell 1.04 kg of cannabis to an undercover officer of the Central Narcotics Bureau. In March 1995 he was acquitted of the capital offence of drug trafficking after the trial judge found him to have “sub-normal intelligence, with an IQ of 74.” Instead he was found guilty of the lesser offence of drug possession and sentenced to a prison term. After the prosecution filed an appeal, the appeal judge sentenced him to death, stating, “He was educationally sub-normal but that does not absolve him from his criminal deeds.” (New Paper, 15 August 1995.)
I think we can all agree that the implementation of the death penalty leaves much to be desired. This is perhaps why the Law Society is submitting a paper to the Law Ministry to relook the application of capital punishment. So, clearly, even lawyers feel there is more to be done.
On that we can agree - and on that note, I shall leave this discussion. I shall not go into the moral debate as it is an endless one, dependent upon a whole slew of particularities, including emotional, religious, philosophical issues.
I will leave with this question regarding Tochi’s case:
Can you traffick something you do not know exist?
Regards,
Zz
Zz
You say that: “…executions in singapore are shrouded in mystery.” But that is not true. The figures have been given by the Singapore Ministry of Home Affairs in http://www2.mha.gov.sg/mha/detailed.jsp?artid=990&type=4
Every time someone is sentenced to death, it is a public decision and the world knows about it. No one is condemned to death in secrecy. So it’s just Amnesty propaganda that popularised the myth that executions are shrouded in mystery. The figures are easy to find. If they wanted to hire me to do it, I could do it in 2 hours. It’s all in the Court of Appeal decisions.
You mentioned something which our former PM Goh said on a BBC Interview. Frankly, I don’t know why he said that and I definitely will not justify it. It seems a very odd thing to say. The death penalty is indeed important and he should think about it. I’m very sure our new PM would not have said the same thing.
Next, to CJ Yong Pung How. I do happen to think that he had the right idea, and was not being cavalier. Believe or not, not all lawyers are honest and reasonable. Some of them may even claim that their client is innocent when that is not so. CJ Yong was basically saying to the lawyer, “You say that he is innocent, but I find him guilty.” It doesn’t mean that CJ Yong convicted an innocent man.
Rozman’s case is definitely fair. If you read the newspaper’s version, then of course you would be alarmed. But believe it or not, the Singapore press is not always accurate in what they print. In Rozman’s case, Rozman’s point is that he has a low IQ. The Court of Appeal’s finding was:
“Rozman was not of unsound mind; neither was he mentally retarded at all material times. While he might be a person of low intellect, he was not so intellectually disabled as to be incapable of knowing the nature of his act or of discerning that the act was wrong and contrary to law. His ‘low intellect’ and disposition to being easily susceptible to manipulation by others were not be a defence to a criminal charge. Neither did these factors diminish or eradicate the presence of mens rea. He was guilty of trafficking in the drugs in the first bundle.”
Basically, the court said that just because you have a low IQ doesn’t mean you do not know what you are doing. The test is whether you know if what you are doing is wrong and against the law. Rozman knew that.
Rozman’s main defence was that since he had a low IQ, he was easily manipulated by others. The court said that being easily manipulated was not a good defence. It’s what I call a Nuremberg defence: I am not responsible since someone else asked me to do it.
Your final question: Can you traffic something you do not know exists?
My answer: No! Of course not.
But that’s not what happened in Tochi’s case. I can accept that if Tochi was walking into the airport and someone put the heroin in his bag without Tochi knowing, then Tochi would be innocent, and I would be the first to protest against his death sentence. Tochi’s story is different. This is what the trial judge said:
“While he was at the terminal, he opened his bag and the capsules spilled out, and he placed them in his gloves, socks, and the chocolate box where the police found them later. When the police questioned him about the capsules he swallowed one of them.”
The Court of Appeal said:
“…Each of the 100 capsules containing diamorphine was found wrapped in layers of aluminium foil, plastic, and adhesive tape. When questioned by the police, the first appellant at first said that the capsules were chocolate, but when the question was repeated he said that they were African herbs
…the true principle is that, ultimately, a failure to inspect may strongly disincline a court from believing an “absence of knowledge” defence. Therefore, to say, as in this case, that the first appellant thought it was chocolates was another way of saying he did not know that he was carrying drugs.
…In the present instance, the first appellant testified that he thought that he was carrying chocolates, later correcting his evidence to African herbs (that tasted like chocolate). This brought his case within the kind discussed in Shan Kai Weng v PP [2004] 1 SLR 57, Tan Ah Tee v PP [1978-1979] SLR 211, and the statement from Ubaka v PP cited in all the cases above as well as by the trial judge in the present case: “[I]gnorance is a defence only when there is no reason for suspicion and no right and opportunity of examination …”. It was sufficiently clear to us, from the trial judge’s grounds of decision, that the court did not believe the explanation of the first appellant…”
So the story is this. When Tochi was caught, he first said that what he was carrying was chocolates. Then he changed his story and said that it was herbs. Then he said that it was pills which were safe, and he swallowed one.
Clearly, Tochi was lying. He changed his story. He said he was carrying chocolates, then he said herbs. He also cooked up this weird tale about being given the drugs by a stranger called “Mr Smith”. It is just unbelievable.
I am prepared to believe that he did not know it was heroin - to Tochi, it could have been ecstacy, PCP or any designer drug. It didn’t matter to him. He knew he was carrying something illegal.
Let me give you a hypothetical example. If a man is asked to drive a container truck across a border, and he hears some movement inside and some voices, can he say that he didn’t know the container had illegal immigrants inside? What if he said that he knew there were people, but he thought he did not know that they were illegals? Would that excuse the driver? Clearly not. So Tochi was given pills to carry for money, the capsules were wrapped up in foil, and Tochi did not put them in a box, but stuffed them all over his clothes. Is that how an innocent man behaves? The money given to him for carrying the pills was US$2000. That’s a lot of money for some herbs, right? I’m not surprised that the court thought his story was doubtful. I would go further and say he is obviously lying. He did not know that the pills were actually heroin, but he knew the pills were illegal. That’s guilt, in any country.
Dear William,
Then it’s pretty amazing to me that the trial judge could conclude that Tochi did not know what he was carrying was drug or that he had found that out by himself.
Regards,
Zz
ZZ
Why is it amazing? The judge never made that conclusion. He never said that Tochi did not know he was carrying drugs. What is frequently misquoted is paragraph 42 of the judgment:
“42 There was no direct evidence that he knew the capsules contained diamorphine. There was nothing to suggest that Smith had told him they contained diamorphine, or that he had found that out on his own.
43 On the other hand, the first accused did not have a consistent belief in the contents of the capsules. When he was first asked if the capsules were chocolate he affirmed that they were, and then said that they were herbs which tasted like chocolate, and then that they were African herbs for stomach problems, when by his own evidence Smith had not informed him of the origin of the herbs, their taste or use.
44 His position on the payment he was to receive for making the delivery was also unsatisfactory. When Sgt Tan interviewed him, Sgt Tan made a contemporaneous note of the promised US$2000. In his signed statement taken by ASP Goh, express reference was made to the US$2000. SSgt Yap also gave evidence that the sum of US$2000 was mentioned although SSgt Yap did not make a record of it in writing.
45 The first accused, however, denied in his defence that he had mentioned the figure and maintained that although he was promised a payment, no amount was mentioned. He had no plausible explanations for Sgt Tan’s note and his own signed statement which made specific reference to US$2000. On the evidence before me, I accepted the Prosecution’s assertion that the first accused was promised US$2000.
46 Why was the US$2000 an issue? It was because the large sum promised should have raised suspicion. The first accused’s evidence was that Smith was not a rich man. He did not have enough money to buy an air ticket for himself to go from Dubai to Indonesia to visit his sick friend. There must be a reason for Smith to offer him the large sum of US$2000 to deliver the capsules of herbs when he was already funding his passages to Dubai and to Singapore. The first accused knew that Smith was a man who would break the law as Smith had arranged for false visas and endorsements to be entered into the first accused’s passport to facilitate his travels. He must have realised that Smith was offering him much more than was reasonable for putting him through the minor inconvenience of meeting up with Marshal at the airport terminal and handing the capsules to him. He should have asked to be shown and be assured of the contents before agreeing to deliver them, and he could have used the ample opportunities he had when he was in possession of the capsules to check them himself, but he did nothing.
47 Counsel made much of the first accused’s youth. The first accused was 18 years old at that time of arrest, but he was not a simple sheltered boy fresh out of his village. He had left school at the age of 14, and played football for a living in Nigeria and in Senegal. After returning home from Senegal, he was confident enough to go abroad again, and decided that he would not go back to Senegal, but would seek better prospects in Dubai instead. He was able to fend for himself when he was stranded in Pakistan and unable to travel on to Dubai. He was rich in life experiences for someone of 18 years.
48 I found that he had wilfully turned a blind eye on the contents of the capsules because he was tempted by the US$2000, which was a large sum to him. When Smith, who had befriended him and had appeared to help him get out of Pakistan, also offered him the US$2000, he did not want to ask any questions or check the capsules himself. Consequently, even if he may not have actual knowledge that he was carrying diamorphine, his ignorance did not exculpate him because it is well established that:
[I]gnorance is a defence only when there is no reason for suspicion and no right and opportunity of examination …
– Yeo Choon Huat v PP [1998] 1 SLR 217 at [22] and his defence cannot stand. He was therefore found guilty and convicted on the charge he faced.”
The judge’s point is that there was no “direct” evidence that Tochi knew he was carrying “diamorphine”. But the judge did not say that Tochi did not know he was carrying drugs. He said that Tochi knew, or “wilfully turned a blind eye” to the fact. The judge’s reasons were as follows:
(1) Tochi said Mr Smith is not a rich man. But Mr Smith was able to promise US$2000 to Tochi - definitely a large sum of money. So what Tochi was carrying was definitely important.
(2) Tochi said that Mr Smith could not have carried the drugs because Mr Smith said he did not have money to buy an air ticket. What about the US$2000? Couldn’t that have been used? The judge said, “There must be a reason for Smith to offer him the large sum of US$2000 to deliver the capsules of herbs when he was already funding his passages to Dubai and to Singapore.”
(3) Tochi knew that Mr Smith was a man who would break the law as Mr Smith had arranged for false visas and endorsements to be entered into Tochi’s passport to facilitate his travels. How many of us can arrange for false visas, etc? Only the criminals. Mr Smith was a criminal, and Tochi knew that.
The judge felt that if a criminal offers you a large sum of money to carry pills into another country, you actually know what he is asking you to do. He is asking you to do something illegal for him. You may not know that the pills you are carrying are actually heroin, but so what? You know you are carrying pills on behalf of a criminal who has paid you a lot of money. Why is the criminal (Mr Smith) doing it? Obviously he is asking you to smuggle drugs.
All that the trial judge said (which has often been misquoted) is that there was no “direct” evidence that Tochi knew he had “diamorphine”. The trial judge did not say that there Tochi did not know he was carrying drugs.
[...] Interesting discussion going on at “theonlinecitizen” (29/01/07). [...]
William,
Omg, just because your post appeared before mine doesn’t mean that I was referring to you. You are making ridiculous assumptions here. If you insist on thinking that some general food for thought that I raised did not explicitly name you or even remotely refer to you is targetted at you, I have nothing else to say. Just because you have raised a topic and that I raise a similar topic doesn’t necessarily mean I am responding to you. The most a person can infer is that both people brought up the same topic, but there is no basis for a causal explanation unless there was a specific mention to any particular person.
If I want to engage in a debate with you, I will name you. I am not afraid of debating with anyone, least of all some anonymous entity on the Internet. I have explained earlier, and I will say it one last time that there are some questions that we should be asking ourselves in case of the war on drugs, which is what underpins everything in Tochi’s case. Please don’t give yourself too much credit in thinking that you are the one who brought the drug issue to the discussion. Everyone knows why Tochi was hanged and why we have such stiff penalties for drug trafficking.
You are pretty intelligent, but please don’t dig your own grave any further by taking things personally. I have explained that I did not target you. You are assuming that I am. If you do not wish to believe, what I say will be pointless because you start with a bias, which is unhealthy for a debate. *Sigh*
KTM,
I didn’t realise the clearing up of the backlog could have contributed to the anomaly in execution rates. Makes sense now that you raise it up.
Hello everyone. I would like to thank William and KTM to point us to alternate sources and opinions on the stats with relation the executions in Singapore. If they are indeed true, then the issue with executions in Singapore might become less sensationalistic, but no less important.
I do not believe that it is right to take another person’s life whatever the term we use - ‘murder’ or ‘kill’ - if there is alternatives because I believe life is sacred. I think this answers the question about killing someone in a war. There is no other alternative to killing enemy combatants if they invade your country and are bent on imposing their authority on you and worse killing you because it is self defense. Is hanging a drug trafficker an act of self-defense? Maybe as a deterrent it is, because it protects you from possible would-be traffickers but it is not an act of self defense in context to the relationship between the caught drug trafficker and society - instead it is a punitive action.
Yet while I believe life is sacred and whenever possible, we should look for alternatives, I have grown up in an environment where the death penalty seems to be an effective deterrent against drug trafficking and I cannot fathom if there could be any other deterrent although I remember in one of my sociology lectures my prof made a statement that it is hard to prove if it is a more effective one while it is given that it is an effective one.
Life imprisonment could also be a effective deterrent as well as a (fair?) punishment. In any case, life is sacred, and we need to fight drugs to protect the lives of other people who may not be at a position to make a decision for themselves like children who may not be matured enough to recognise the dangers of using drugs. These lives are also sacred.
So is it justifiable to take one life to protect countless others? It has been argued that it is. And sadly I agree. It is sad that it seems to be the only recourse we have to protect the lives of others that we need to use capital punishment. And because it is such, we should always use it as a measure of last resort and be careful with how we wield it as a tool to protect our society.
The thing about this case is that it seems we didn’t leave ourselves any room that he could be innocent because we started with the presumption he was guilty. If you think about it, if we had started out with the presumption he was innocent, would it be possible for us to prove his guilt? I have been reading some comments on the law with regards to this and it seems that while we can be sure of the guilty act, we cannot be sure of the guilty mind. I think it is always hard to prove guilt as well as innocence, so the presumption (that I have recently learnt about) that he is first guilty then needs to be proved innocent is to me an expedient choice of presumption.
And that scares me. Because I think proving of innocence is sometimes not as easy as we might believe. If one of the flaws of certain legal systems is that the guilty can walk free, I think ours is that the innocent will be punished. Some have argued that these are collateral damage we need to accept against the war on drugs and for the protection of our society, but while collateral damage is arguably inevitable, it should be minimised if not considered unacceptable at all. And it seems in Singapore, we do not leave ourself room for error.
With regards why the blogosphere did not have such intense discussion with regards to other hangings, I cannot speak for everyone but for myself. It is only recently when I stumbled onto blogs like Alex and started blogging myself that I have begun to seriously start thinking about issues such as these, questioning my assumptions and become clearer on my own stand about them. We should maybe not hold it against the blogosphere for seemingly double standards by not talking about earlier cases. Maybe we should take encouragement in the blogosphere’s awakening.
Anyway, I think the point about this case is it magnifies an attitude that is found in Singapore which is a combination of two things: ‘no choice what, what else can we do’ and ‘it will never happen to me so why bother’. So however we may feel about Tochi with regards to his guilt or innocence, the key is to realise that the process that determined his guilt/innocent should be a worrying one and the fact that little was done to check this process and few even concern it an issue worth considering should also concern us.
Take care guys. I just hope none of us will be in a position where we have to prove our innocence when we know we are indeed innocent.
Hi Ian,
Well put. Thank you.
Personally, I would only support the death penalty for child crimes - especially sexual crimes committed on children. But this is just my personal view, and I admit it could be an emotional one. But still, I will support death for paedophiles.
The case of Tochi, as most of us here and in other blogs discussions, has brought to focus the flaws in our system. And it is not only the trial itself or what the judge said which casts doubts on its integrity.
I am concerned about three things:
1. The presumption of guilt. As long as you’re found with drugs on your person and as long as it’s over a certain limit prescribed by the law, you are presumed to be trafficking in the drug.
2. Having been presumed guilty, the onus is then on you to prove his innocence. This bothers me for several reasons:
- Not all accused have access to high-powered or good lawyers. It could be due to finances or plain ignorance on the part of the accused.
- State-assigned lawyers handle many cases and it is questionable if they would be able to devote as much time to capital cases as they should.
- Being caught in a foreign country, accused persons may not know how to go about defending themselves.
3. Access to lawyers after being detained. Accused persons are not allowed contact with their lawyers (or in fact anyone else) unless and until the police have ‘completed their investigation’ - which can take anywhere from a day to months. The police alone has the perogative and decides when the accused can see his lawyer.
Any right-thinking person would question this last point.
But as every cloud has a silver lining, I am hopeful that the Law Society’s submission to the Law Ministry on certain changes to the implementation of the death penalty will be accepted.
I would urge the Law Society to publish their recommendations and allow us to discuss it and debate it.
That is how we can truly become a participative society.
I would hate it if the Ministry does not accept the recommendations (even though I am not sure what they are) without a public debate.
I would also urge the mainstream media to get into the act and allow extensive publicity for the issue.
For did not our own government once declared that ‘every singaporean counts’? And if so, then before we put another singaporean to death, let us act like we mean what we say.
“Every Singaporean counts”.
I would add that every life counts too - whether Singaporean or foreign.
Regards,
Zz
To add, another thing I am concerned about is whether we have lawyers who specialise in death penalty cases. And even if we do, how well-versed are they in it? And how many actually specialise in it?
Dear William,
There is no direct evidence either that Tochi knew what he was carrying was drugs.
Regards,
Zz
Dear William,
One point.
You said: “You may not know that the pills you are carrying are actually heroin, but so what? … Obviously he is asking you to smuggle drugs.”
I am not sure what you are talking about. As far as I can see, you are presuming that he should have known. If we send a man to die based on what we presume, then it is indeed sad.
Regards,
Zz
About that government report. It sounds similarly skewed as those in response to other criticism (such as those to the SDP):
Just an example:
AI alleges:”Official information about the use of the death penalty in Singapore is shrouded in secrecy” (1)
Fact: For good reasons, Singapore of course does not conduct executions in public. But it is absurd for AI to allege that the “death penalty in Singapore is shrouded in secrecy”. Singapore has one of the most fair and transparent legal systems in the world. All judicial decisions involving the death penalty are open to public scrutiny. All trials and appeals (including capital cases) are conducted in public. Indeed, the more newsworthy trials are routinely reported in the local and even international media. AI has, from time to time, sent observers to attend trials in Singapore.
This statement has many serious problems. That Singapore has one of “the most fair and transparent legal system” has been questioned. It is true that in business matters, the legal system is fair. But in other criminal matters and also in civil cases, the legal system is used as an educational tool by the elite. Jury trials, for instance, were abolished. Just one judge rules in a case. The law has also been used extensively against members of the opposition (high ratings come from perception indexes, not from objective legal studies! I recommend reading: Franci Seow’s book “Beyond Suspicion”)
When does the local media report about the “newsworthy” cases? This sounds as if Singapore’s media was free to report openly about the cases, which it is not.
AI has also often been blocked from entering Singapore such as in a recent case to speak on an anti-death penalty forum.
This statement has many half-truths and is typical of the shrewd use of words.
Greetings people - for some reason my posts did not seem to appear, so you may see some multiple postings from me.
Ian Timothy: welcome to what has become a surprisingly burgeoning debate. I have to take issue with you when you make the statement that there is a presumption of guilt. Why do you say that? There is no presumption of guilt (that is another myth that has been propagated). Normally I would have asked you to prove what you say, but I won’t since I know you can’t.
The presumption which is frequently misquoted is that any person against whom it is proved to have a controlled drug in his possession shall, until the contrary is proved, be presumed to have known the nature of that drug.
In other words, if you have heroin on you, then it is for you to say that you did not know it was heroin, but you thought it was chocolate. It is not a presumption of guilt by any means. There is no such thing.
Now in case you think that it is a special Singapore invention to have a presumption that someone knows the nature of something he carries, then think again. We borrowed it from the British.
In a famous 1969 case, Lord Pearce (a respected British judge) described a presumption as “an improvement of a difficult position”: see Warner v Metropolitan Police Commissioner [1969] 2 AC 256 at 307. Rebutting the statutory presumption is a matter of fact, and is no different from any other fact-finding exercise save that the law requires that a person rebutting a statutory presumption does so on a balance of probabilities.
In other words, the starting point is this: since you have been caught with controlled drugs, we assume that you know what they are. But if you can give an explanation to show why you don’t know, then you win. And it is not an explanation “beyond reasonable doubt” but only “on a balance of probabilities”. So all you have to do is to provide some probable explanation, and you are home free. Tochi was not home free because, as I have quoted, his explanation was highly improbable, and in fact ridiculous.
Now, you have actually gone further than most people here, because you have actually proposed an alternative: Life imprisonment. I actually think it is a much worse fate than death. In addition, while they are kept in prison, they are a cost to society (I know it is not fashionable to talk about cost but then I really would like to be practical for once, someone has to pay for prisoners). The worst flaw, I believe, is that prisons are not perfect. In other societies, there are reports of “lifers” killing other prisoners and wardens because they know that there is no worse punishment for them.
But I want to look at the flip side. If we are talking about fighting drugs, it’s essentially an economics argument for the drug dealer. If we send a clear message “mandatory death penalty” it will factor into the drug dealer’s risk assessment. He will choose other routes and avoid us. It works. It scares the hell out of people - just ask any tourist who comes here. They all know that in Singapore, drugs mean death. It’s gruesome but then it’s a gruesome topic to deal with. There is no nice and neat way to fight drugs.
Steve: you say that in criminal cases the system is “an educational tool for the elite”. I can’t understand why you would say that. What possible motive would there be for the criminal justice system to be used as an educational tool for the elite? I can understand it if you are talking about political cases. But criminal cases? What possible motive could Parliament, or the trial judge, have to “fix” Tochi? Tochi is not a political opponent, or anything like that. He was just a guy who took a crazy risk and was caught. I have read the case report over and over again and I can’t see how you can complain that Tochi didn’t get a fair hearing. He was given every chance to explain. All he needed to do was to come up with a probable story. Others have been acquitted before. Tochi lost because he was lying and he got caught.
ZZ
You said, “Another thing I am concerned about is whether we have lawyers who specialise in death penalty cases. And even if we do, how well-versed are they in it? And how many actually specialise in it?”
Thankfully, there are a number of lawyers who do capital offence cases. There are not many such cases because (unlike what Amnesty says) there are only a few people charged with such offences each year.
The law requires anyone charged with a capital offence case to be given a lawyer, if he does not have the money to pay for one. The state will pay for him. AND the accused doesn’t get any green lawyer straight from law school. The accused gets one, and sometimes two lawyers, and the lead counsel is usually a very senior lawyer. Lawyers such as the late Law Society President Palakrishnan, and senior counsel such as Alvin Yeo, Jimmy Him and Harpreet Singh have all fought such cases and won. Believe me, they are well-versed.
You also said, “There is no direct evidence either that Tochi knew what he was carrying was drugs.” There is no “direct” evidence doesn’t mean there is no evidence. In law there is “direct” and “circumstantial” evidence. Direct evidence is an eyewitness, circumstantial evidence is everything else. So if I am accused of stabbing a man to death, then “direct” evidence would be evidence of a person who saw or heard me do it. Circumstantial evidence would be blood on my clothes, fingerprints on the knife, evidence that I had been quarrelling with the deceased, etc.
Circumstantial evidence may lead to convictions. In Singapore, Sunny Ang was one of the most famous men to be convicted of murder through circumstantial evidence. In Britain and in the United States, many convictions are secured through circumtantial evidence.
So when the judge said that there was no “direct” evidence that Tochi knew he had heroin, all that the judge meant is that technically no one heard or saw any evidence that Tochi was told that the pills were heroin. The judge was being fair to say that there was no direct evidence. But the judge also had to look at circumstantial evidence to see if Tochi knew.
Hello William.
I’m confused now. If you assumed that someone knew he was carrying heroin, doesn’t that now mean you presume he is guilty of drug trafficking under Singapore law, and that he has to prove he is innocent by showing that he did not know it was heroin and thus not trafficking.
And I do not need to prove to you that we started out with the presumption he was guilty of drug trafficking. You quoted the law that Singapore has which shows that we start out with that presumption of guilt. But I am no law student so maybe I am indeed misunderstanding that passage.
But it does seem like it is very different from the doctrine of ‘innocent till proven guilty’. I am unfamiliar with the specifics of the case so I am unsure if the prosecution showed evidence that proved he was guilty or rebutted whatever evidence the defense used to show his innocence. I think there is a difference between the two actions.
Thanks for reminding me, but I never did think that ‘presumption’ was a Singapore invention. But just because other people are using something like it does not make it right and I think the issue now is whether it is a right one to have and that is what people are discussing.
Dear Ian Timothy
The confusion occurs because when we watch TV and read legal thrillers, we come across phrases like “presumed innocent”, etc. That is a different thing entirely. It is a fundamental principle of justice that every person is presumed innocent until he is proven guilty. In that case, a presumption of innocence is overturned when the prosecution proves it “beyond all reasonable doubt”. That presumption relates to the final decision which the court makes: whether someone is guilty or not guilty. If there is reasonable doubt over the final decision, then the accused is NOT guilty.
Before reaching the last and final decision, the court has to make a number of subsidiary decisions, or steps. Did this happen? Did that happen? Let’s say that one of the questions the Court had to decide was whether “Mr Smith” really existed. Who has to prove that? The answer is Tochi, because it is part of Tochi’s case. Does he have to prove it “beyond reasonable doubt”? No, only “on the balance of probabilities”.
Out of the many subsidiary decisions the court has to make is whether Tochi knew that what he was carrying was heroin. Now, here is the problem. Anyone would say that they did not know what they were carrying was heroin. And it is impossible for the authorities to prove that he knew. Not “difficult” but “impossible”. When it comes to knowledge, not just in Singapore but in any jurisdiction, knowledge cannot be proven. So the law does the next best thing: inference. It infers knowledge from the surrounding circumstances. It splits up the burden like this: the police have to prove that you were “in possession” (sometimes that is difficult, in this case it was not) and you have to prove that you did not “know” what you were carrying was heroin. After that, there are still steps to go before the judge can say “guilty”. For example, Tochi could have argued duress, etc. So presumption of knowledge does NOT mean presumption of guilt. It is still some distance away from that.
In all common law jurisdictions (such as UK and USA) criminal knowledge is often inferred through presumptions. Why? Because it’s logical. Let’s say you are carrying something. It is common sense to assume that you would know what you are carrying. It is possible that you do not know, and if so all you have to do is provide a “probable” explanation. The judge doesn’t even have to buy it, he just has to say it is probable.
Otherwise, it would be virtually impossible for any authorities to show that anyone “knew” anything.
Presumptions are used in many jurisdictions and they are generally accepted as a fair legislative device. I know you are concerned because the consequences are so severe. But the reasoning process should not change just because something is trivial or severe. The reasoning remains the same.
By the way, the test is not whether Tochi knew that he was carrying heroin, the test is actually whether Tochi knew that he was carrying something illegal. Did he?
Let’s take another situation. What if Tochi was told that what he was carrying was cocaine? And later it is proven that it is heroin? Can Tochi escape because he thought that he was doing something wrong (cocaine), but not so wrong (heroin)? No. The principle is that if you intend to do something wrong, but something more seriously wrong happens, then you are also responsible. Again, that is fair.
In Tochi’s case, he clearly knew that he was being asked to do something illegal. He was given false visas, he didn’t declare the “chocolates” through customs, and he stored the pills all over his body. The judge said that there was no evidence that he knew the pills were heroin (that is the part that is often misquoted) but the judge also went on to ask whether Tochi knew what he was doing was wrong anyway.
The prosecution’s case seemed quite clear, in my opinion. They went ahead and caught the drug dealer, Nelson (another fact that is often overlooked) and established that Tochi was delivering the pills to Nelson. There was evidence which, to me, looked like Tochi knew Nelson before. Basically it was not the story that Tochi painted. And all that was established by the prosecution. Tochi, for his part, could not prove anything he said. His story was not even “probable”. I encourage you to read it for yourself, I have reproduced the gist of it in an earlier post. Tochi’s story is not really convincing. In fact, it shows that Tochi was lying.
To sum it up:
1. a presumption as to a fact is not the same as the presumption of innocence.
2. when knowledge is an issue, a presumption is often used because there is no other way to prove if someone knows or does not know anything.
3. in this case, I think it is right to ask people who are carrying heroin to explain themselves, and tell what happened. If a “probable” story is given, then the verdict will be “not guilty”. If the story is that a stranger called “Mr Smith” gave you pills and a forged visa to travel, and paid you US$2000 to deliver the pills instead of flying there himself, and you stuff the pills in your socks and in your clothes, and when you are caught you say that the pills are chocolate, then it sounds like you knew what you were doing and you were just making things up.
I note with very great interest on what William has said.
“The presumption which is frequently misquoted is that any person against whom it is proved to have a controlled drug in his possession shall, until the contrary is proved, be presumed to have known the nature of that drug.
In other words, if you have heroin on you, then it is for you to say that you did not know it was heroin, but you thought it was chocolate. It is not a presumption of guilt by any means. There is no such thing.”
Let me cut and paste the relevant section under the Misuse of Drugs Act showing the presumptions of guilt.
Presumption concerning trafficking
17. Any person who is proved to have had in his possession more than —
(a) 100 grammes of opium;
(b) 3 grammes of morphine;
(c) 2 grammes of diamorphine;
(d) 15 grammes of cannabis;
(e) 30 grammes of cannabis mixture;
(f) 10 grammes of cannabis resin;
(g) 3 grammes of cocaine;
(h) 25 grammes of methamphetamine;
(ha) 113 grammes of ketamine; or
(i) 10 grammes of any or any combination of the following:
[note this part is missing because it's an image file]
whether or not contained in any substance, extract, preparation or mixture shall be presumed to have had that drug in possession for the purpose of trafficking unless it is proved that his possession of that drug was not for that purpose.
Now, the Act clearly states that once you possess more than a certain amount, you are presumed to be trafficking the drug. And trafficking of drugs is an offence, right? So, before one steps into the court of law, you are already guilty unless you can prove your innocence. Consider the reverse, where you are not presumed to be guilty unless proven beyond a reasonable doubt. If the prosecution cannot prove that all the facts point to the possession of the drug with the intent to traffick and there can be no reasonable alternative explanation, the accused is a free man.
In which case is the odds stacked against the accused? Should it be the business of the prosecution to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, or for the defendant to prove innocence on a balance of probabilities? Why the former has been applied in many countries is because it’s all so easy to accuse someone. By applying the guilty unless proven innocent presumption, as long as there’s a “balance of probability” that a person is guilty, any Tom, Dick or Harry can just be sued, and the prosecution/plaintiff just have to sit there to shake leg. Is it fair to only be probably sure (the standard of balance of probabilities), or is it fairer to be very sure (the standard of beyond reasonable doubt)?
On a side note, William wrote:
“Now, you have actually gone further than most people here, because you have actually proposed an alternative: Life imprisonment.”
Sounds very typical of Singapore styled politics. If one wishes to comment on politics, one should be a politician. If one wishes to comment on a policy, one should have an alternative solution. So, what’s the business of encouraging Singaporeans to speak up if people who speak their mind without a proposed solution are deemed to be somewhat of less worth than those who have a solution?
Dear Aaron
I’m afraid you have quoted the wrong section. The Tochi case was concerned with Section 18(2) (which I have already quoted) not Section 17.
And please don’t accuse me of being a Singapore politician!
That is the last thing I am and the last thing I want to be. Neither do I want to defend SM Goh’s statements. Just because I happen to support capital punishment doesn’t