EXTERNAL (for general distribution)AI Index: ACT 50/05/95

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No. of words: 3282

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Amnesty International

International Secretariat

1 Easton Street

London WC1X 8DJ

United Kingdom

30 August 1995

@JUVENILES AND THE DEATH PENALTY

EXECUTIONS WORLDWIDE SINCE 1985

Introduction

The execution of people for crimes committed under the age of 18 is prohibited under international human rights standards and international treaties having the force of law. And yet several countries permit by law or practice the execution of juvenile offenders. Executions of juveniles are few compared to the total number of executions carried out worldwide each year. However, their significance goes far beyond their numerical scale and calls into question the commitment of some countries to respect the right to life and international law and human rights standards.

Amnesty International opposes the death penalty without reservation in all cases as a violation of the right to life and the right not to be subjected to cruel, inhuman or degrading punishment. In keeping with its opposition to the death penalty, it supports measures which limit the application of the death penalty and this includes laws which prevent the execution of juvenile offenders - people sentenced to death for crimes committed under the age of 18.

Executions of Juveniles Worldwide

Since 1985 Amnesty International has documented executions of juvenile offenders in eight countries. Information on these executions follows:

Bangladesh

Mohammad Selim was sentenced to death by a martial law court and executed on 27 February 1986. Information available to Amnesty International indicates that he was 17 years old at the time of his execution. The government has claimed that he was at least 18.

Iran

Since the creation of the Islamic Republic of Iran in 1979, thousands of prisoners have been executed, many after summary trials. Amnesty International understands that juveniles under 18 have been among those executed but the organization has for the most part been unable to document individual cases.

In one rare documented case, Kazem Shirafkan, aged 17, was executed for murder in 1990¹.

In 1992 the UN Special Rapporteur on summary or arbitrary executions, Mr Bacre Waly Ndiaye, reported that three young men, two aged 17 and one aged 16, were executed on 29 September 1992².

Iraq

Children under the age of 18 have been executed in Iraq. In November and December 1987, five Kurdish juveniles aged between 15 and 17 were among 31 Kurds reported to have been executed by firing squad following summary military trials. Eight others aged between 14 and 17 were reported to have been executed on 30 and 31 December 1987.

Nigeria

Eighteen-year-old Matthew Anu was executed by firing squad with two condemned men on 26 February 1989. He is believed to have been 17 or younger at the time of the offence, which was committed in June 1987. Nigerian law permits executions of people over the age of 17.

Pakistan

On 15 November 1992, 11 men and boys were hanged in Punjab province, including a 17-year-old.

In 1993, a 12- or 13-year-old illiterate Christian boy, Salamat Masih, was charged with the capital offence of blasphemy, together with two adult men. One of the men was subsequently murdered by Islamists but the remaining accused were convicted on 9 February 1995 and sentenced to death. On 23 February 1995, both were acquitted on appeal though demonstrators outside the court made clear that they wanted the two appellants executed irrespective of the verdict. Both of those acquitted had to go into exile for their own safety.

Saudi Arabia

In 1992 the UN Special Rapporteur on summary or arbitrary executions reported that a Shi’a Muslim, Sadeq Mal-Allah, had been beheaded on 2 September in the eastern town of Al-Qarif. He was reportedly sentenced to death at the age of 17 on charges relating to blasphemy after a trial at which he was denied a lawyer.³

Yemen

A 13-year-old boy, Nasser Munir Nasser al-Kirbi, was publicly hanged in the capital, Sana'a, on 21 July 1993, along with three men. They had been convicted of murder and highway robbery. Amnesty International does not have details of the judicial process in this particular case but has serious concerns about the fairness of trials in death penalty cases in Yemen⁴.

United States of America

The country which accounts for the majority of documented executions of juveniles in the world is the United States of America. The USA has executed more juveniles since 1985 than any of the preceding countries (with the possible exceptions of Iran and Iraq where figures are difficult to confirm).

Since 1985, prisoners who were juveniles at the time of the crime for which they were sentenced to death have been held on the death rows of 13 US states. Twelve states currently hold juveniles on death row. Nine executions of juvenile offenders have been carried out in five states since 1985; all of those executed were 17 at the time of the offence. Of all US states, Texas has carried out the biggest number of executions in the USA over the past decade (more than 85 as at 1 April 1995) and has put to death five juvenile offenders.

Brief details of the cases of the nine executed juveniles are given below. (The prisoner's race or ethnic grouping and the state are indicated in square brackets.)

Charles Rumbaugh [white, Texas] was a 17-year-old at the time of a murder carried out during a robbery. He started criminal activity at the age of six and at 12 had committed an armed robbery. When he was executed by lethal injection on 11 September 1985, ten years after his conviction, he was the first juvenile for 21 years to be executed in the USA.

James Terry Roach [white, South Carolina] was 17 years old at the time of a double murder carried out in the company of an adult male and another juvenile. The younger accomplice testified in exchange for a lighter sentence. Roach and the other defendant both pleaded guilty and were sentenced to death in December 1977, barely six weeks after the crime. Roach was represented by a court-appointed attorney who was under investigation for irregularities in his legal practice. On appeal, lawyers submitted evidence of diminished intellectual capacity, with an IQ of 75 to 80, and possible signs of Huntingdon’s Disease, a progressive neurological disease. Despite appeals from former US President Jimmy Carter, UN Secretary-General Javier Pérez de Cuéllar and other world figures, he was executed on 10 January 1986.

Dalton Prejean [black, Louisiana] was 17 years old at the time of the murder of a police officer in 1977. Prejean was tried before an all-white jury and represented by a court-appointed lawyer. At his trial, evidence was presented of intellectual impairment. His IQ was measured at 71. He was abandoned by his mother at the age of two weeks and was raised by a relative who was reportedly violent. From the age of 13 he spent time in institutions and was diagnosed as suffering from various mental illnesses including schizophrenia. At age 14 he was committed to an institution for killing a taxi driver. Medical opinion recommended long-term hospitalization under strict supervision. He was nevertheless released after three years, reportedly because of lack of funds to keep him institutionalised. Despite appeals for clemency in 1989 and 1990 he was electrocuted on 18 May 1990, 12 years after being sentenced to death.

Jay Pinkerton [white, Texas] was executed by lethal injection on 15 May 1986, nearly five years after two murders committed when he was 17.

Johnny Garrett [white, Texas] was convicted of the murder of a 76-year-old white nun at the age of 17. He had a long history of mental illness and was severely sexually and physically abused as a child. This history was not revealed at the trial. Between 1986 and 1992, three medical experts reported that he was chronically psychotic and brain-damaged as a result of head injuries sustained as a child. Appeals for clemency from Pope John Paul II and from the Franciscan Sisters religious community to which the murdered nun belonged were to no avail and Johnny Garrett was executed by lethal injection on 11 February 1992.

Curtis Harris [black, Texas] was 17 years old at the time of the crime - the murder of a white man in 1978. He was one of nine children brought up in extreme poverty. He was regularly beaten as a child by an alcoholic father. At the trial, three black jurors were excluded; his jury was all white. Several years after his conviction and death sentence he was examined by Dorothy Otnow Lewis, Professor of Psychiatry at New York University School of Medicine, who found that he had a low IQ (77) and had organic brain damage resulting from beatings suffered as a child. None of the information about his upbringing or mental capacity was raised by his lawyer at the original trial. His appeals against the sentence failed and he was executed on 1 July 1993.

Frederick Lashley [black, Missouri] was aged 17 at the time of the offence and was the first juvenile offender to be executed in Missouri for 60 years when he was subjected to lethal injection on 28 July 1993. He was convicted and sentenced to death by an all-white jury in 1982 for the murder of his cousin in 1991. He was under the influence of drugs at the time of the killing. He had been abandoned at a young age by his mother and had been brought up by relatives. He began drinking alcohol heavily at the age of 10 and at the time of the crime was homeless. At his trial he was represented by a lawyer who had never previously acted in a capital case.

Christopher Burger [white, Georgia]. This man, shown in the photo in his US Army uniform, was the first juvenile offender to be executed in Georgia under its current death penalty law. He was 17 at the time of the murder, committed in 1977, for which he was convicted. He was sentenced to death in 1978. The sentence was vacated but in 1979 he was again sentenced to death. Fourteen years later he was executed by electrocution.

At his trial he was represented by a lawyer who had not previously acted in a capital case. Although US juries are required to consider mitigating factors in deciding whether to impose a death sentence, Christopher Burger's lawyer did not present mitigating evidence at the sentencing hearings in either 1978 or 1979. The jury was therefore not told that Christopher Burger had a low IQ, that he was mentally ill and brain damaged from physical abuse received as a child, or that he suffered from a highly disturbed, unstable upbringing and had attempted suicide at the age of 15.

In 1989, Dr Dorothy Lewis of New York University School of Medicine examined Christopher Burger and found organic brain impairment and mental illness. He was scheduled to be executed on 18 December 1990 but received a last-minute stay of execution pending an appeal based on the issue of his mental competence at the time of the crime. The appeal failed and he was executed on

7 December 1993.

Ruben Cantu [Latino, Texas] was 17 at the time of the offence. He was represented by an inexperienced lawyer, had a troubled family upbringing and was of limited intellectual capacity. He was convicted of murder in 1984 and was executed on 24 August 1993.

Still remaining on death row, along with 36 others in US prisons, is Sean Sellers. This young man from Oklahoma was 16 years old at the time of the murders for which he was convicted. These included the killing of his parents. Contested psychiatric evidence was presented at his trial suggesting that he was insane at the time of the killings, but he was convicted and sentenced to death. In March 1987 he was examined by Dr Dorothy Lewis of New York University School of Medicine who found that he was chronically psychotic.

Some juveniles on death row have had their appeals upheld and their sentences commuted. Among them was:

Paula Cooper [black, Indiana], who was 15 years old at the time of the murder for which she was convicted. An international campaign on her behalf, based in Italy, brought her case to world attention. In September 1987 Pope John Paul II urged clemency and in March 1989 a petition with one million signatures calling for clemency for Paula Cooper was presented to the United Nations. In July 1989 her sentence was commuted to life imprisonment.

The background of the majority of the US prisoners whose cases are described above was one of serious emotional if not material deprivation. Many were regular users of drugs or alcohol with lower than average intelligence. Some had organic brain damage. Some had poor or inexperienced legal counsel. Highly relevant information was withheld at their trial due either to incompetence or to inexperience on the part of their lawyers.

International Norms

The use of the death penalty against juvenile offenders is prohibited under numerous international instruments. The relevant texts are as follows.

* International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR): "Sentence of death shall not be imposed for crimes committed by persons below eighteen years of age ..." (Article 6(5))

* Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC): "Neither capital punishment nor life imprisonment without possibility of release shall be imposed for offences committed by persons below eighteen years of age." (Article 37(a)).

* American Convention on Human Rights: "Capital punishment shall not be imposed upon persons who, at the time the crime was committed, were under 18 years of age..." (Article 4(5)).

* Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War of 12 August 1949 (Fourth Geneva Convention): "In any case, the death penalty may not be pronounced on a protected person who was under eighteen years of age at the time of the offence."(Article 68)

* Protocol I of 1977 Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 1949: "The death penalty for an offence related to the armed conflict shall not be executed on persons who had not attained the age of eighteen years at the time the offence was committed." (Article 77(5))

* Protocol II of 1977 Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 1949: "The death penalty shall not be pronounced on persons who were under the age of eighteen years at the time of the offence ..." (Article 6(4))

* Safeguards Guaranteeing Protection of the Rights of Those Facing the Death Penalty (UN Economic and Social Council resolution 1984/50, adopted on 25 May 1984 and endorsed by the UN General Assembly in resolution 39/118, adopted without a vote on 14 December 1984): "Persons below 18 years of age at the time of the commission of the crime shall not be sentenced to death..."

The first six instruments cited above are international treaties, binding on all states parties to them. Any state which becomes a party to one or another of these instruments without entering a reservation to the relevant article is bound under international law to respect the prohibition of use of the death penalty against juvenile offenders under the circumstances to which the instrument applies⁵. The Safeguards Guaranteeing Protection of the Rights of Those Facing the Death Penalty are not legally binding but were endorsed by the UN General Assembly without a vote, a sign of a strong consensus among nations that their provisions should be observed.

National law and practice

More than 100 countries whose laws provide for the death penalty for at least some offences either have provisions in their laws which exclude the use of the death penalty against juvenile offenders for any crime, or may be presumed to exclude such use by virtue of becoming parties to the ICCPR, the CRC, or the ACHR without entering a reservation to the relevant article. But despite the international norms, a number of countries have laws which permit the imposition of death sentences on juvenile offenders in at least some circumstances. Most of these countries set age limits of 16 or 17, but a few set lower ages⁶.

As described in this paper, eight countries are reported to have executed juvenile offenders since 1985. Three of them have done so in violation of their obligations as parties to the ICCPR⁷.

Conclusions

There is an emerging international consensus that juvenile offenders must not be sentenced to death. A majority of states are now parties to international treaties which prohibit the sentencing to death of juvenile offenders. A small number of states continue to execute juvenile offenders, but such executions are rare and are only a tiny fraction of the total number of executions carried out each year.

Amnesty International urges all states to cease executions and abolish the death penalty in law. Where the death penalty remains on the statute books, a minimum age of 18 should be provided for in legislation in conformity with international standards.

TABLE OF REPORTED EXECUTIONS OF JUVENILE OFFENDERS

(JANUARY 1985 - JUNE 1995)

COUNTRY	NAME OF PRISONER	AGE	DATE OF EXECUTION
Bangladesh	Mohammed Selim	17 at time of execution8	27 February 1986
Iran	Kazem Shirafkan Three young males	17 at time of execution One aged 16, two aged 17 at time of execution	1990 29 September 1992
Iraq	Five Kurdish juveniles Eight Kurdish juveniles	Aged between 15 and 17 at time of execution Aged between 14 and 17 at time of execution	November-December 1987 30-31 December 1987
Nigeria	Matthew Anu	17 or younger at time of offence, 18 when executed	26 February 1989
Pakistan	One juvenile	17 when executed	15 November 1992
Saudi Arabia	Sadeq Mal-Allah	17 when sentenced to death	2 September 1992
USA	Charles Rumbaugh James Terry Roach Jay Pinkerton Dalton Prejean Johnny Garrett Curtis Harris Frederick Lashley Christopher Burger Ruben Cantu	17 at time of offence 17 at time of offence in 1977 17 at time of offence 17 at time of offence in 1977 17 at time of offence 17 at time of offence in 1978 17 at time of offence 17 at time of offence in 1977 17 at time of offence	11 September 1985 10 January 1986 15 May 1986 18 May 1990 11 February 1992 1 July 1993 28 July 1993 7 December 1993 24 August 1993
Yemen	Nasser Munir Nasser al'Kirbi	13 at time of execution	21 July 1993