Early release for Dr Wisut raises questions: Death penalty

[webfact]

CRIMINAL PUNISHMENT SYSTEM
Early-release for Wisut raises questions
The Nation

BANGKOK: -- THAILAND'S DEATH sentence has become a hot topic again after the death sentence of former gynaecologist Dr Wisut Boonkasemsanti, who killed his estranged wife and dismembered her in 2001, was commuted to only 10 years, seven months and 25 days in jail due to pardons for his good behaviour.

Under a punishment suspension project for a special occasion, Wisut was released from Bang Kwang Prison after seven years, earlier this week, before his jail term could be completed in September 2017, while he would be on probation for the rest of his prison term.

Wisut was among many death-row inmates who were granted early release. Others included Serm Sakhonrat, who had murdered and dismembered his girlfriend while he was a medical student.

Serm received the sentence reduction five times from 2004-2011 and hence served only eight years behind bars and was released December 2011.

The three special occasions in 2010, 2011 and 2012 led to sentence reductions for inmates; death-row convicts for general crimes saw their punishment reduced to life sentence in 2010; further reduced to 50 years in prison in 2011, and to 25 years in 2012. Death-row inmates on drug charges would generally serve 18-20 years behind bars.

Although penologists claim that a 15-year jail term would destroy a convict's potential to commit crimes, that might not apply to criminal offenders aged 20-25. After a 15-year jail term, they would be released at the age of 40 and would still have the potential to commit crimes.

There were other serious criminals who also had their sentences commuted and thus would be free in years, such as Somkid Pumpoung - "Thailand's Jack the Ripper" - who was convicted for robbing and killing five sex workers.

In Thailand, the jail term includes the time spent by the accused in detention pending the trial. Thailand has three courts - primary, appeals and supreme. As the finalisation of the court ruling would take about 7-8 years, by the time the final sentence is pronounced the convict might not spend much longer in jail because the detention period is deemed as part of the sentence.

When an inmate, also a first-timer to get a jail term, enters a prison, he/she would be a "middle-rank" inmate. When the inmate does good deeds such as working in prison and not creating any problem for two years, he/she would be promoted to an "excellent" inmate. Inmates who risk their lives to aid state officials during a riot would be promoted to "excellent" inmate faster. Inmates who violated prison regulations or discipline would be demoted to "poor" or "very poor" inmates.

The general pardon to be given to inmates would provide different reduction rates. For example, an "excellent" inmate would see his/her sentence slashed by half and a "middle-rank" inmate would see sentence commuted by one-fourth, while an "excellent" inmate for a drug charge would see a lower reduction at only one-fourth or one-fifth. The "poor" and "very poor" inmates would not get a pardon, a jail time reduction or a punishment suspension. The jail time reduction and punishment suspension are reserved for "excellent" inmates who were jailed for the first time and had less than five years to serve.

From October 2013 to June 2014, a total of 18,292 inmates saw their punishments suspended, while 17,757 inmates saw their sentences commuted.

Regarding the concerns of society that the convicts might repeat their offences, it was reported that 15 per cent of convicts in Thailand were later arrested for crimes - compared to 40 per cent in the United States. While many people back the "revenge theory" to punish offenders harshly as they "deserved", others say it is important to give the people - especially those without a criminal nature - a chance to turn over a new leaf and become a good member of society.

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/national/Early-release-for-Wisut-raises-questions-30240418.html

 

[thenation]2014-08-07[/thenation]

[kurnell]

Are these people paying their way out or what?

[Bkungbank]

Killing 1 maybe deserved a new life to pay back what has done in the past, sometimes we are angry, jealous or lost of mind due to stress to do something terrible wrong it's happen in human life but killing more then 1 should not consider an accident but intention to kill and should put to sleep like other danger to soceity security.

 

The doctor are serving his terms in jail by helping to cure other inmate in cell as other way to pay back his sins .

Edited August 7, 2014 by metisdead
Oversize font reset to normal.

[SABloke]

Can't compare arrest rates as it it is not a reflection of crimes committed. Perhaps the US police force is more efdicient, hence the higher atrest rate for repeat offenders, but how do they know that xx% of released prisoners did not commit crime - they can't and they don't. Edited August 7, 2014 by SABloke

[khwaibah]

Ever a time for the junta to step in is now..This is totally unacceptable.

Edited August 7, 2014 by khwaibah

[The Deerhunter]

Ever a time for the junta to step in is now..This is totally unacceptable.

Whatever that means.  What is "totally unacceptable?"  Early release? Should he have been executed? Post what you mean to say.  We are not mind readers.

Edited August 7, 2014 by The Deerhunter

[jpeg]

The death penalty has no place in any civilised society. End of.

[Halion]

Simply ludicrous on all levels. Furthermore by taking life he broke his Hippocratic oath and should be banished from the medical profession.

[rethaier]

Do you really believe we live in a civilized world.  Syria, Iraq, Adghanistan, Israel, Thailand, Palestine, Nigeria and many places in the world, yes western countries too, are killing or abusing each other daily.  Where is the civilized world.  Most people act in a civilized way, many due to fear of retribution,  but to call this world a civilized society is a bit of a strech IMHO.

[Zeegator]

Are these people paying their way out or what?

 

Read the post, it explains everything for you.  the releases depend on "good behaviour" and degrees of that behaviour.
 

[Zeegator]

Simply ludicrous on all levels. Furthermore by taking life he broke his Hippocratic oath and should be banished from the medical profession.

 

"...by taking life he broke his Hippocratic oath..."

 

Not at all, the oath doesn't cover that and if it did it would apply to that doctors patients.
 

[klauskunkel]

It's quite clear that in the scheme of things, murder is not a serious crime in Thailand, if you compare it with let's say plucking mushrooms in a national park. I think violent crimes are viewed as proportionally much more rehabilitable than other crimes, being Thai and thus having Thainess mitigates a lot...

[Valentine]

It's quite clear that in the scheme of things, murder is not a serious crime in Thailand, if you compare it with let's say plucking mushrooms in a national park. I think violent crimes are viewed as proportionally much more rehabilitable than other crimes, being Thai and thus having Thainess mitigates a lot...

The mushroom case & many others which are really minor misdemeanours, but heavily punished, truly shows the glaring double standards in Thai justice. A Ferrari driver who not only killed someone in most horrific circumstances but then tried to pervert the course of justice walks free. There are many examples of this while the poor are meted harsh punishments for seemingly trivial offences.

 

[sangfroid]

Are these people paying their way out or what?

Is the Pope a Catholic?

[kurnell]

 

Are these people paying their way out or what?

 

Read the post, it explains everything for you.  the releases depend on "good behaviour" and degrees of that behaviour.
 

 

 

So you believe everything you read?

[PETDCAT]

Hopefully his estranged wives family will dismember him and return him to prison in neatly wrapped packages.  

[kurnell]

 

Are these people paying their way out or what?

Is the Pope a Catholic?

 

 

Not according to The Nation

[Artisi]

 

Are these people paying their way out or what?

Is the Pope a Catholic?

 

Well he's certainly not Jewish, Muslim or ever C of E

[ezzra]

Not many thing make sense in Thailand and this is one of them, how, from death sentence to serving

only few year in jail and free to resume your life as if nothing ever happened? defy logic, NOT THAI

logic though.....

[JesseFrank]

The death penalty has no place in any civilised society. End of.

 

In my country the death penalty means life in prison without a possibility on probation.

 

By the way how about the policemen that were sentenced to death, and got bail the very next day, about a year ago ?

 

Have they spent a single day in prison yet ?

[glasswort]

The death penalty has no place in any civilised society. End of.

Absolute rubbish. The only place that can do without the death penalty is Utopia and there is no such thing in our world.

[Thai at Heart]

Although penologists claim that a 15-year jail term would destroy a convict's potential to commit crimes, that might not apply to criminal offenders aged 20-25. After a 15-year jail term, they would be released at the age of 40 and would still have the potential to commit crimes.



Where the he did they get this theory from?

[Basil B]

So here we go again... a lynch mob who know very little of the facts.

 

So what do you want "25 years on death row and a 2 hour long botched execution"?

 

We do not know how and in what circumstances his wife died, but many murders are not premeditated and I doubt that she was still alive when he cut her up, saying that cutting up a body to dispose of it to hide the crime should not go unpunished, nor the fact that he did kill his wife.

 

Is cutting up a dead body any different to putting it on a bonfire and cremating it?

 

If it is established that a person who has taken someone's life is remorsefulness and "beyond the doubt of reasonable probability" is unlikely to commit murder again, should they not be released after serving many years in prison  if they can be a benefit to society rather than a burden as keeping someone incarcerated is?  

 

Many murders are the result of "Domestic Violence" which is probably the case here too, would it not be better to nip the problem in the bud by stigmatizing domestic violence?

Falling murder rate linked to decline in domestic violence

A 40% drop in domestic violence is the most likely reason for fewer murders, which typically involve a family member

The startling fall in the murder rate in England and Wales to its lowest level for nearly 30 years has been driven by a remarkable and largely unexplored decline in domestic violence since the mid-1990s.

The number of killings has fallen steadily for the past nine years, since the murder rate peaked at 1,047 in 2002-03 when the 172 victims of Dr Harold Shipman were included in the figures.

http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2012/jul/19/falling-murder-rate-domestic-violence

[GentlemanJim]

Simply ludicrous on all levels. Furthermore by taking life he broke his Hippocratic oath and should be banished from the medical profession.

 

It may come as a surprise to you but most Doctors do not take the Hippocratic oath and there is no punishment for breaking it if they do, although there is punishment of course for malpractice. Out of 128 medical schools in the USA only at 3 do they take the original Hippocratic oath, some more do a modified version. The majority take an oath under the Geneva convention but all in all only about 70% of Doctors take an oath. In the UK only around 50% of Doctors take an oath, In France many students give a written oath. It is Important to note that the oath is not legally binding in any way. The chances of Doctors in Thailand taking the hippocratic oath are pretty slim I would have thought, and if they do there is no obligation to keep it. I guess it is slightly amusing that people say the original Hippocratic oath, which is well recorded in history as being written by Hippocrates is out of date and does not fit into modern times, yet a book written by a collection of people whose provenance is very difficult to determine around 1500-2000 years ago is accepted as the word of God by a few billion people in the world and is found to be completely applicable to modern times and its fictional stories accepted as true occurrences. 

Edited August 7, 2014 by GentlemanJim

[kuiburi]

A person could kill (not murder) another person true emotional circumstances  , example , someone hurts or murders ur kids or lovedones .

Think that this person not deserves jailtime , I think that it is in human instinct that defending ur lovedones from further harm by such person is normal .

 

Killing and murdering are 2 totall different acts and should not be punished the same way .

 

A person that murders for personel advantage , may it be for lust or financial , should not get out of jail , and if the deathsentence is applyed then so be it .

[vogie]

The death penalty has no place in any civilised society. End of.

I hope you are not speaking for the rest of us, end of.

[belg]

why even pronounce death sentence in the first place?

 

pleading guilty = life

 

some royal pardons = 10 years and free ?

 

 

[khunken]

 

The death penalty has no place in any civilised society. End of.

I hope you are not speaking for the rest of us, end of.

 

 

Well he is speaking for me.

 

The legal & justice systems in Thailand are all over the place and AFAIK the death penalty is still on Thailand's books for some crimes.

 

Some pay their way out of justice (Red Bull heir and others), some get sentenced to death and have their sentences commuted by admitting their crime. Some get totally disproportionate sentences for minor offences, especially if they are poor and some are sentenced to death and get bail.

 

Additionally given the BIB's far too often penchant of arresting and charging scapegoats, the death penalty would quite likely result in innocents being executed. It has happened in so-called advanced societies but some put revenge above miscarriages of justice unfortunately.

 

All these (media-driven?) articles are just knee-jerk reactions when some horrifying case emerges, or re-emerges as with the Op. Cooler heads are needed to put a brake on pent up emotions.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

It's perfectly normal to have a pardons process in the judicial system. In Thailand case, as the article obliquely says, its done on "special occasions," which everyone here should know and understand.

 

But the point that deserves addressing is: Why should inmates who receive the death penalty for grisly or multiple murders be able to get pardoned down to very short sentences (particularly when counting in pre-sentencing detention time).

 

If you're going to have a pardons process for death row inmates, let it be doing from death to life in prison, or 50 or 30 years. But to go from a death sentence to 10 years for the kinds of crimes mentioned in the OP is beyond belief.

 

[arunsakda]

Capital punishment does not prevent crime. It is not applied on an equitable basis, basically turning out to be completely racially biased( as applied in US). It leaves those innocently convicted with no hope at all. And, even in the most obvious cases when there is no doubt of guilt of heinous crime, speaking as as an American, still puts us on the same level as many Nations that do not even attempt a pretense of concern for human rights (PRC, DPRK, Saudi,etc.)

The death penalty is atrocious and should be banned in all cases. Period. Edited August 7, 2014 by arunsakda