Stephen Fitzpatrick, Jakarta correspondent | October 21, 2008
INDONESIA'S Constitutional Court has thrown out an application by the Bali bombers to have their death sentences conducted by a method other than firing squad.
The death-row trio had argued that death by shooting would constitute torture and they would prefer beheading, lethal injection, hanging or some other means.
The court's decision would not have had any automatic effect either way on the imminent executions of Amrozi, Ali Ghufron or Imam Samudra, since the institution is not directly linked to the criminal justice system.
Only the parliament, when formulating new law, is required to take heed of constitutional court rulings - the Supreme Court, the country's highest criminal justice arena, is not so obliged.
However Attorney-General Hendarman Supandji has said he would give details on Friday regarding his plans for the three terrorists' executions.
The decision now clears the way in a broad sense for Mr Supandji to proceed.
The men will most likely be executed in secret on their prison island of Nusakambangan, off southern Java. The bodies of the two brothers, Amrozi and Ali Ghufron, will then be taken to their home village of Tenggulun, in East Java, while Imam Samudra's - real name, Abdul Azis - will be taken to West Java, hundreds of kilometres away.
The men's lawyers, led by long-time advocate Ahmad Michdan, called witnesses during the weeks-long trial including Catholic priest Charlie Burrows, who attended the recent firing squad deaths of two Nigerian heroin smugglers.
Father Burrows testified that the two men in his care had taken more than seven minutes to die after the firing squads responsible for dispatching them appeared not to have scored a direct hit on the heart.
Law reform commentators both inside and outside Indonesia have warned that the bombing trio's convictions are already unsound, since they were obtained under anti-terrorism laws passed after the 2002 Bali nightclub atrocity, which claimed 202 lives including those of 88 Australians.
The Supreme Court has already ignored a prior Constitutional Court ruling on this matter, when the bench on the latter court found that existing criminal law should have been used to obtain convictions in the case, rather than the retrospective application of the anti-terrorism legislation.
Even the bombers' lawyers, including Mr Michdan, accept that the men would be found guilty under the correct laws - for which the death penalty would also apply - but have argued Indonesia's still-shaky rule of law would be undermined by executing them under the wrong legislation.
Fellow defence strategist Wirawan Adnan said after the decision yesterday that "Amrozi's execution is not our immediate concern; the main thing here is that this is a constitutional issue".
He pointed to the court's advice to the Government, in its 76-page ruling, that the legislature consider alternative methods of execution that could guarantee a quick dispatch.
Mr Wirawan said afterwards that this should mean beheading became the norm.
INDONESIA'S Constitutional Court has thrown out an application by the Bali bombers to have their death sentences conducted by a method other than firing squad.
The death-row trio had argued that death by shooting would constitute torture and they would prefer beheading, lethal injection, hanging or some other means.
The court's decision would not have had any automatic effect either way on the imminent executions of Amrozi, Ali Ghufron or Imam Samudra, since the institution is not directly linked to the criminal justice system.
Only the parliament, when formulating new law, is required to take heed of constitutional court rulings - the Supreme Court, the country's highest criminal justice arena, is not so obliged.
However Attorney-General Hendarman Supandji has said he would give details on Friday regarding his plans for the three terrorists' executions.
The decision now clears the way in a broad sense for Mr Supandji to proceed.
The men will most likely be executed in secret on their prison island of Nusakambangan, off southern Java. The bodies of the two brothers, Amrozi and Ali Ghufron, will then be taken to their home village of Tenggulun, in East Java, while Imam Samudra's - real name, Abdul Azis - will be taken to West Java, hundreds of kilometres away.
The men's lawyers, led by long-time advocate Ahmad Michdan, called witnesses during the weeks-long trial including Catholic priest Charlie Burrows, who attended the recent firing squad deaths of two Nigerian heroin smugglers.
Father Burrows testified that the two men in his care had taken more than seven minutes to die after the firing squads responsible for dispatching them appeared not to have scored a direct hit on the heart.
Law reform commentators both inside and outside Indonesia have warned that the bombing trio's convictions are already unsound, since they were obtained under anti-terrorism laws passed after the 2002 Bali nightclub atrocity, which claimed 202 lives including those of 88 Australians.
The Supreme Court has already ignored a prior Constitutional Court ruling on this matter, when the bench on the latter court found that existing criminal law should have been used to obtain convictions in the case, rather than the retrospective application of the anti-terrorism legislation.
Even the bombers' lawyers, including Mr Michdan, accept that the men would be found guilty under the correct laws - for which the death penalty would also apply - but have argued Indonesia's still-shaky rule of law would be undermined by executing them under the wrong legislation.
Fellow defence strategist Wirawan Adnan said after the decision yesterday that "Amrozi's execution is not our immediate concern; the main thing here is that this is a constitutional issue".
He pointed to the court's advice to the Government, in its 76-page ruling, that the legislature consider alternative methods of execution that could guarantee a quick dispatch.
Mr Wirawan said afterwards that this should mean beheading became the norm.
Source: The Australian
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