The Discretionary Death Penalty for Drug Couriers in Singapore: Four Challenges

In 2012, Singapore amended its Misuse of Drugs to give courts hearing capital drug trafficking cases the discretion to replace the default death penalty with life imprisonment and caning, provided that the accused person can show that he was merely a drug courier and the prosecution certifies that h...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Author: CHEN, Siyuan
Format: text
Language:English
Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2016
Subjects:
Online Access:https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/sol_research/1534
https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/sol_research/article/3486/viewcontent/DiscretionaryDeathPenaltyDrugCouriersSingapore_2016_Siyuan.pdf
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Institution: Singapore Management University
Language: English
id sg-smu-ink.sol_research-3486
record_format dspace
spelling sg-smu-ink.sol_research-34862017-04-24T05:55:55Z The Discretionary Death Penalty for Drug Couriers in Singapore: Four Challenges CHEN, Siyuan In 2012, Singapore amended its Misuse of Drugs to give courts hearing capital drug trafficking cases the discretion to replace the default death penalty with life imprisonment and caning, provided that the accused person can show that he was merely a drug courier and the prosecution certifies that he had substantively assisted the authorities in disrupting drug trafficking activities. The Singapore High Court and Court of Appeal have since made important pronouncements on the 2012 amendments, but several challenges remain: first, whether the privilege against self-incrimination has been further eroded; secondly, whether an accused person can invoke the statutory relief of being a courier only at sentencing; thirdly, whether it is appropriate to leave the certification decision solely to the prosecution; and finally, whether guidelines as to when the death sentence is appropriate should have been prescribed. These challenges ought to be given serious legislative or judicial consideration as the criminal justice system in Singapore continues to evolve in response to changing public perceptions of due process and crime control. The first three challenges, in particular, may have important ramifications for potentially innocent accused persons as it is submitted that the law as it stands may incentivise some of them to plead guilty from the outset to maximise their chances of avoiding the death penalty. As there are still a number of jurisdictions that retain the mandatory death penalty for drug trafficking offences, this article may also be of comparative interest, especially since there appears to be a dearth of literature on the discretionary death penalty for drug offences. 2016-01-01T08:00:00Z text application/pdf https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/sol_research/1534 info:doi/10.1177/1365712715613493 https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/sol_research/article/3486/viewcontent/DiscretionaryDeathPenaltyDrugCouriersSingapore_2016_Siyuan.pdf http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law eng Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University Misuse of Drugs Act Discretionary Death Penalty Presumption of Innocence Privilege against Self-Incrimination Newton Hearing Prosecutorial Discretion Singapore Asian Studies Law and Society State and Local Government Law
institution Singapore Management University
building SMU Libraries
continent Asia
country Singapore
Singapore
content_provider SMU Libraries
collection InK@SMU
language English
topic Misuse of Drugs Act
Discretionary Death Penalty
Presumption of Innocence
Privilege against Self-Incrimination
Newton Hearing
Prosecutorial Discretion
Singapore
Asian Studies
Law and Society
State and Local Government Law
spellingShingle Misuse of Drugs Act
Discretionary Death Penalty
Presumption of Innocence
Privilege against Self-Incrimination
Newton Hearing
Prosecutorial Discretion
Singapore
Asian Studies
Law and Society
State and Local Government Law
CHEN, Siyuan
The Discretionary Death Penalty for Drug Couriers in Singapore: Four Challenges
description In 2012, Singapore amended its Misuse of Drugs to give courts hearing capital drug trafficking cases the discretion to replace the default death penalty with life imprisonment and caning, provided that the accused person can show that he was merely a drug courier and the prosecution certifies that he had substantively assisted the authorities in disrupting drug trafficking activities. The Singapore High Court and Court of Appeal have since made important pronouncements on the 2012 amendments, but several challenges remain: first, whether the privilege against self-incrimination has been further eroded; secondly, whether an accused person can invoke the statutory relief of being a courier only at sentencing; thirdly, whether it is appropriate to leave the certification decision solely to the prosecution; and finally, whether guidelines as to when the death sentence is appropriate should have been prescribed. These challenges ought to be given serious legislative or judicial consideration as the criminal justice system in Singapore continues to evolve in response to changing public perceptions of due process and crime control. The first three challenges, in particular, may have important ramifications for potentially innocent accused persons as it is submitted that the law as it stands may incentivise some of them to plead guilty from the outset to maximise their chances of avoiding the death penalty. As there are still a number of jurisdictions that retain the mandatory death penalty for drug trafficking offences, this article may also be of comparative interest, especially since there appears to be a dearth of literature on the discretionary death penalty for drug offences.
format text
author CHEN, Siyuan
author_facet CHEN, Siyuan
author_sort CHEN, Siyuan
title The Discretionary Death Penalty for Drug Couriers in Singapore: Four Challenges
title_short The Discretionary Death Penalty for Drug Couriers in Singapore: Four Challenges
title_full The Discretionary Death Penalty for Drug Couriers in Singapore: Four Challenges
title_fullStr The Discretionary Death Penalty for Drug Couriers in Singapore: Four Challenges
title_full_unstemmed The Discretionary Death Penalty for Drug Couriers in Singapore: Four Challenges
title_sort discretionary death penalty for drug couriers in singapore: four challenges
publisher Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University
publishDate 2016
url https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/sol_research/1534
https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/sol_research/article/3486/viewcontent/DiscretionaryDeathPenaltyDrugCouriersSingapore_2016_Siyuan.pdf
_version_ 1772829855323258880