"Marietta Bosch was hanged" said Herman Kau, Botswana's...

"Marietta Bosch was hanged" said Herman Kau, Botswana's commissioner for prisons. Her capital sentence was confirmed on January 30, by the Appeal Court, that included commonwealth judges Sir John Blufeld from England, Lord Weir of Scotland, Timothy Agudar from Nigeria, Justice Patrick Tebbutt from South Africa, and another judge from Zimbabwe. The Court dismissed the appeal of Marietta Bosch, from South Africa, 50, sentenced to death in February 2000 for murdering Maria Wolmarans, her best friend, in June 1996, so she could marry the victim's husband. "She was a wicked and despicable woman. The murder had been planned over a long period, no doubt as a result of jealousy and infatuation," said British judge Timothy Aguda. Marietta Bosch was represented by British barrister Desmond de Silva. After the court hearing, she was led away and put in death row in Gaborone central prison. Bosch is the first white woman to hang in Botswana since it won independence from Britain in 1966. The same day of the execution, President Festus Mogae during a visit to London told The Sunday Telegraph that he would refuse clemency to Mariette Bosch. However, "When our attorney contacted the office of the president and the prison authorities on Friday (the day prior to execution) they did not even tell him the warrant had been signed and the execution scheduled," Wolmarans, Marietta Bosch's husband, said. "There are no words to explain how you feel," Tienie Wolmarans, Bosch's husband said in his first interview since his wife was led to the gallows. "Devastated, sad, angry, hurt. I don't think anyone can explain how you feel because at this moment I don't really know what to feel. At times it is difficult to believe that this has actually happened. I believe that an innocent person has been executed." The execution, two months after Mariette's appeal, was an all-time record for Botswana, where executions normally take about nine months and often several years. It happened so quickly because of the growing international controversy over the case. The decision not to allow the Wolmarans family to make a final visit to Mariette was made by Joseph Orebotse, Botswana's prisons commissioner. "By this hasty decision, and I call it indecent haste, they have denied Mariette the right to live. They denied her constitutional rights (to petition the President for clemency) before being executed. There should be an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the hasty decision to execute her." Wolmarans said on April 6.On February 6, South African President Thabo Mbeki was asked by the family of South African Marietta Bosch to appeal to the Botswana Government for clemency and on February 11, it was reported that he would consider a request by the South African Human Rights Commission to intervene on behalf of Mariette Bosch.