The Death Penalty and the Desirability of Judicial Discretion

• Main Authors: MOHAN, S. Chandra, Chia Wen Qi, Priscilla
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2013
• Subjects: Criminal Law
• Online Access: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/sol_research_smu/52; https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1051&context=sol_research_smu
• Institution: Singapore Management University

The changes to the death penalty for murder were finally announced in Parliament late last year.1 As promised earlier by the Law Minister, this followed consultations with law officers, legal practitioners and academics. The new murder provisions 2 contain no surprises as the mandatory death penalty is to be retained, as previously announced, only for intentional killing under s 300(a) of the Penal Code. For the three remaining forms of murder under s 300(b) to s 300(d) of the Code, namely, intentionally causing a bodily injury the offender knows is likely to cause death, intentionally causing a bodily injury sufficient in the ordinary course of nature to cause death and committing an act the offender knows is so imminently dangerous that it must in all probability cause death, the death penalty is to be imposed at the sole discretion of the trial Judge. He may opt instead to impose life imprisonment with caning.