Photo/Illutration The container on a tape recording of exchanges between a death row inmate and staff at the Osaka Detention House (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

Even condemned convicts are individuals whose dignity and rights should be protected. Procedures for their executions should meet human rights standards.

Death row inmates are informed of their executions on the day they are carried out and then escorted to the scaffold. They are put to death within one or two hours of being told the day has finally arrived.

The Osaka District Court is hearing a case filed by two condemned prisoners contesting the constitutionality of informing convicts of their executions only hours before they take place. The lawsuit submitted in November asserts the practice violates Article 31 of the Constitution, which states that no “criminal penalty be imposed, except according to procedure established by law.”

In explaining the policy of informing death row inmates shortly before the sentence is carried out, the Justice Ministry maintains the practice is designed to prevent them from becoming psychologically unstable and committing suicide.

But this approach raises serious constitutional and legal questions. The code of criminal procedure bans the execution of a person in a state of “non compos mentis” (not of sound mind), which means being not mentally competent. It applies to pregnant women, too.

The code allows death row inmates and their legal representatives to file a complaint about the timing of the execution. Under current procedures, however, inmates are not permitted contact with the outside world and effectively denied the right to file a complaint. This makes it impossible for a third party to check whether an inmate was in a condition that allowed execution.

The way inmates are taken abruptly to their deaths also raises humanitarian concerns. They should be at least given time to prepare and leave notes or messages to someone, if they want.

This issue has attracted public attention due to a rare audio recording of an exchange between a death row inmate, his sister and prison staff two days before the man was hanged. The recording made at the Osaka Detention House in 1955 was presented as evidence in the lawsuit. The exchange was the last the woman would have with her brother.

Condemned inmates were apparently informed of their executions a day or two before they were carried out until around the mid-1970s. The recording was made at the behest of the prison warden and kept by relatives of the executed inmate. In the recording, the inmate expressed remorse for his crime and gratitude for people he knew until his last moments.

This shows that some, if not all, condemned inmates, if informed of their executions beforehand, can use the time to reflect quietly on their lives and face their fates.

There are fundamental ethical questions about capital punishment, including whether the state should be allowed to kill criminals, given the risks of executing someone who has been wrongfully convicted. Even some experts who support the death penalty have called for a review of death by hanging, which many people contend is cruel.

Asahi Shimbun editorials have called for the death penalty to be abolished. Although it seems unlikely that Japan will abolish capital punishment any time soon, changes in the related procedures should be made.

Constant efforts are needed to review and improve policy measures to provide support for the bereft families of victims whose lives were suddenly snuffed out and ease the burden they have to bear, even slightly.

More than two-thirds of nations have legally or effectively abolished the death penalty. In the developed world, only Japan and about half of all U.S. states maintain this form of punishment.

In the United States, death row inmates and their legal representatives are informed of the date of execution at least 30 days beforehand. The United Nations’ human rights institution has repeatedly conveyed to the Japanese government its human rights concerns about the way condemned inmates are informed of their executions on the day of their deaths.

This is an issue that Japan cannot just ignore.

--The Asahi Shimbun, Oct. 29

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