Close to 100 convicted killers cannot now be executed...

Close to 100 convicted killers cannot now be executed in Trinidad and Tobago, because they either have petitions pending before international human rights organizations or the five-year limit set by the London-based Privy Council for them to be kept on death row has been exhausted, Attorney-General Glenda Morean-Phillips said.
Speaking in the Senate, Morean-Phillips said the government had not yet decided on what to do with 34 convicted killers, who cannot now be lawfully executed because the five-year period has expired, and that a policy decision would have to be made on whether prisoners who can no longer be executed should be removed from death row.
She told legislators that another 52 death-row inmates also have matters pending before the Appeals Court, the Privy Council and international human rights bodies.
In its 1993 ruling regarding the murder case of Jamaicans Pratt and Morgan, the Privy Council ruled that states had five years to carry out the death sentence or convicted killers must be spared.
In March 2002, the Privy Council ruled that imposing the mandatory death penalty for a murder was a violation of the constitution of some Caribbean states.
In addition, the Privy Council also ruled that condemned persons had the right to be heard before the Mercy Committee and that, if not satisfied with the decision of the Mercy Committee, they had the right to apply for judicial review - a decision court observers say could take more than five years.
Morean-Phillips told legislators "the general rule laid down in Pratt and Morgan is that execution must be carried out within five years from the date of conviction. However, depending upon the individual circumstances of the case, it is possible for an execution to be declared cruel and unusual even if it is carried out within five years."
"Although the rule in Pratt and Morgan is a general rule, the courts have adopted the policy that once five years have elapsed from the date of conviction, the death penalty should be commuted. In such circumstances, it has been commuted to one of 75 years imprisonment with hard labour," she added.
Morean-Phillips told the Senate the Privy Council had declared that any attempt to execute a prisoner before his appeals before international human rights bodies were exhausted, would also be unlawful.
She said that of the 34 death-row prisoners who can no longer be executed, six have petitions pending before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, 13 have appeals pending before the Court of Appeal and the rest have matters pending before the Privy Council.
In 2002, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) ordered the Trinidad and Tobago government to pay 50,000 US dollars to support and educate the son of executed multiple murderer Joey Ramiah. Ramiah was one of 10 people executed over a weekend in 1991.