COMMENTS ON THE DEATH PENALTY SELF-DEFEATING

Dame Anita Allen weighed in last week on the front pages of both daily newspapers about the death penalty and its applicability in Bahamian law.  Everyone and their grandmother knows that as a practical matter, the death penalty is a dead letter.  The question is what is the effect of raising an expectation of the death penalty when every lawyer worth their salt knows that it won’t happen?  The Privy Council long ago ruled in a case called Tido that there is a two-tier test for applying the death penalty: the defendant must be guilty of the worst of the worst which the law lords did not define but so far no case has passed muster, and you have to be able to show that the defendant is incapable of being rehabilitated. The latter is impossible. Dame Anita claimed that the prosecutors could be more aggressive in seeking the death penalty in certain cases. We are firmly against the death penalty and so is the Prime Minister.  Hubert Minnis, the former Prime Minister, announced that he was for the death penalty but while he was Prime Minister, he did nothing about it.  Our point is why raise it, if you know it cannot happen, no matter what you do, the British law lords who watch over us and who we refuse to move will not allow it to take place. So you are whistling dixie and it is not helpful in the midst of this crime debate.