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Executed Indonesian may have been denied justice by clerical blunder: Supreme Court
Jakarta Globe - April 30, 2015
On its website, the final court of appeals said on Thursday that the case review that it received from Zainal – and subsequently rejected two days before he was put to death – had been submitted 10 years late.
The Palembang District Court in South Sumatra initially convicted Zainal in August 2001 to 18 years in prison for possession of 58.7 kilograms of marijuana. Prosecutors, who had sought the death penalty on trafficking charges, mounted an appeal with the Palembang High Court, which duly handed down the death sentence less than a month later.
In May 2005, Zainal's lawyers filed a case review, or PK, a final form of appeal that is heard by the Supreme Court. In keeping with procedure, the case review was filed with the original court hearing the case, which was expected to forward the case to the Supreme Court.
However, the Palembang District Court did nothing with the case for nearly 10 years, until April 8 this year, when it grew increasingly apparent that Zainal would be among the next batch of inmates to be put to death.
"The Supreme Court's assistant clerk for special crimes did not receive the PK until April 8, 2015," chief clerk Soeroso Ono said in the statement on the website.
"That means that from May 2, 2005, until April 2015, the case was not in the hands of the Supreme Court clerk. The Supreme Court had less than a week in which to hear the review, from April 21, 2015, when it reached the judges, to April 27, 2015, when the ruling was handed down."
Soeroso said it was worrying that the Palembang District Court had failed to forward the case to the Supreme Court for nearly a decade, and urged courts across the country to be more meticulous about sticking with judicial procedures.
However, there was no explanation from the Supreme Court for why it had not sought to stay Zainal's execution, given that his case review was still being heard when prosecutors notified him about the impending execution.
Legal analysts have also expressed concern that the court's rejection of the case review may have been influenced by the time pressure that the judges were under, and that had the review been heard in 2005, as it was supposed to, the outcome might have been different.
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