There is currently a rather large squawk about the soon-to-be beheading of a woman convicted of killing an infant in Saudi Arabia. The Bull fails to see the reason for the concern over the execution of violent criminals, either there or – more importantly – here in America.
Let’s look at a bit of the story from the Associated Press. I edited out the extraneous bits about human rights, (which The Bull supports within reason), groups so we could focus on the real story. Also you will find my thought posted therein in a red font.
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia â€??? A surge of beheadings that could surpass the kingdom’s record of 191 in 2005. After dropping to 38 last year, the figure for 2007 is already at least 102, including three women, according to Amnesty International.
Beheading has always been the punishment meted out to murderers, rapists, drug traffickers and armed robbers in Saudi Arabia. Saudi authorities, facing sustained criticism from foreign human rights groups, insist they are simply enforcing God’s law. (A fact proven time, after time, after time is that the death penalty does deter crime. Even with that fact neglected, the criminal executed will not be a ‘repeat offender’, now will he?)
An estimated 5.6 million foreign workers, many of them Asian, serve a Saudi population of 22 million. Of the 102 executed this year, half were foreigners, including 21 Pakistanis, according to Amnesty International. “The workers commit big crimes against Saudis,” charged Suhaila Hammad of Saudi Arabia’s National Society for Human Rights. She said the number of executions has risen because crime has increased.
She said prisoners are treated humanely and that beheadings deter crime.
“Allah, our creator, knows best what’s good for his people,” Hammad told The Associated Press. “Should we just think of and preserve the rights of the murderer and not think of the rights of others?” (Doesn’t much matter what name you choose to attach to the Deity, this is a true statement. Hammad also plainly points out the major flaw in the American judicial system today – that the criminal has more ‘rights’ than the victim.)
Beheadings are carried out with a sword, (Much faster and cleaner than the ax or any machine driven system.), with police holding back spectators and making sure no one takes photos. Prisoners, usually sedated, are made to kneel, flanked by clerics and law enforcement officials and facing the victim’s family.
“The prisoner now recites verses from the Quran (though not required) while a government official reads the charges and the verdict,” according to an account in Arab News, a Saudi daily. “Halfway through the reading the executioner suddenly nicks the back of the prisoner’s neck with his sword, causing him to tense and raise his head involuntarily.”
Then, in one swift move, the prisoner is decapitated.
In a recent interview with Al-Yaum daily, Fahd al-Abdullah, an executioner in the Eastern Province, called his job “a very ordinary profession, just like any other profession.” Al-Abdallah, 27, comes from a long line of executioners. As a child he would watch his grandfather wield the sword, and later was trained for a year by his uncle.
He said that before a beheading, he urges the victim’s family to pardon the prisoner. Some families do, just minutes before the blade falls. Others do it before an execution date is set in exchange for money or in response to appeals from members of the royal family. A famous case was that of Samira Murait. In 2000 she shot dead a male acquaintance who stalked her after she married. After vigorous mediation efforts and pleas from the public as well as from a Saudi prince, the family agreed to forgive her. She had spent seven years in prison. (Whoa! Did you get that, folks? No government bureaucracy, no begging for a governors clemency or Presidential pardon. Just convince the family of the victim to stop the execution and it is done. No questions asked.
The Bull has got to tell you folks something. While I am not a fan of Islam, of Saudi Arabia, or of the Arabs or Persians as a people, I do admire the simplicity – and the Justice – in their system of executing scum. We need a similar system here in the United States and it saddens me to think that a country ruled by corrupt oil sheiks has better control over criminals than we do.
No, I’m not saying that we should necessarily take up beheading as a punishment. (Americans have a deep rooted aversion to that form of execution that The Bull has never really understood.) However the rest of the system, from the public executions – to – the victim, or family of the victim, having the last word on the matter, should be integrated into our system of Justice. That includes expanding the list of criminals receiving capital punishment to include rapists, drug traffickers, armed robbers, and child molesters of all levels, of course.
I suspect that will remain a dream… for now.
Bull, out.
