The death penalty conforms with the Constitution, but should only be applied in “exceptional” cases, the Constitutional Court said yesterday.
The judgement was issued in response to a petition by prisoners on death row who said that capital punishment was unconstitutional.
“The death penalty is a capital punishment and its scope of application should still be limited to special and exceptional circumstances,” Chief Justice Hsu Tzong-li (許宗力) said during a lengthy readout of the court’s decision.
Photo: Ritchie B. Tongo, EPA-EFE
While the right to life is protected by the Constitution, “such protection is not absolute,” the court said in a statement.
“The court emphasized that because the death penalty is the most severe punishment and irreversible in nature, its application and procedural safeguards — from investigation to execution — should be reviewed under strict scrutiny,” it said in reference to the crime of murder.
However, “the judgement did not address the constitutionality of the death penalty in general or when imposed for other offenses,” such as treason or drug-related offenses, it said.
Imposing the death sentence is “prohibited” for “defendants with mental conditions, even if their mental conditions did not influence their offense in the cases in question,” the statement said.
Additionally, people on death row “should not be executed if they have a mental condition to an extent that impedes their competency for execution,” it said.
Democratic Progressive Party lawmakers yesterday affirmed the legality of capital punishment in the Criminal Code, adding that they would respect the court’s decision.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers criticized the ruling, saying “it effectively abolished capital punishment in Taiwan.”
The court’s decision runs contrary to the expectations of the majority of Taiwanese, they said.
Human rights advocates and groups opposed to capital punishment expressed disappointment with the Constitutional Court’s judgement, saying that government agencies had not pushed for a genuine decision on the issue.
“We shall keep up the fight. We hope that some day Taiwan will no longer have the death penalty,” they said in a statement.
“The Constitutional Court must be resolute in defending human rights by declaring the death penalty to be unconstitutional,” they said. “Then we can lead Taiwanese society forward to rise above hatred and using state violence as a deterrent.”
“It is time to break the cycle of taking lives and hatred to allow society to start the healing process,” the groups said. “It is unfortunate that the court did not do so.”
Taiwan Alliance to End the Death Penalty director Lin Hsin-yi (林欣怡) said that the government has not taken a firm stance on capital punishment because of divided public opinion on the issue.
However, DPP members are mainly in favor of abolishment, but they did not make an unequivocal statement to clarify their stance, Lin said.
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