A Papua New Guinea judge warned that he will not hesitate...

A Papua New Guinea judge warned that he will not hesitate to impose the death penalty in the worst cases of murder. Justice Moses Jalina issued the warning after considering the evidence in the murder trial of Tumu Luna, 30, of Imbilike village, Kompiam, Enga Province.
But Justice Jalina stopped short of imposing the death penalty, sentencing Luna instead to life imprisonment with hard labour. Luna was found guilty of killing a man, claiming he mistook the victim for a pig. But that claim had been dismissed by the State's evidence, the judge said, and the victim had called out "brother, please leave me" before the single shot was fired.
The evidence showed there was no doubt that Luna shot the man in cold blood and without any mercy. The maximum penalty for willful murder had been raised from life in jail to the death penalty by an Act of Parliament in 1991, the judge said. Since then, the National Court had imposed the death penalty in two cases. In one case, the decision was quashed on appeal. In the other case, an appeal against conviction was dismissed on May 4, 2000.
In the Luna case, both the defence and the prosecution lawyers argued against imposing the death penalty. "The public prosecutor had submitted that the Luna case was not a "worst type"case. Justice Jalina agreed and said in that case the maximum penalty was not warranted in the circumstances.
"However, to echo the society's condemnation of someone's life having been taken prematurely and to sound a warning to others ... I sentence the prisoner to imprisonment in hard labour for life," he said.