DEATH ROW SYNDROME: A DEATH BEFORE FINAL DEATH

 A LINK TO OUR LIFE Let me take you to a nostalgic fear of your life, which you must have faced or experienced in your school time. Imagine ...

 A LINK TO OUR LIFE

Let me take you to a nostalgic fear of your life, which you must have faced or experienced in your school time. Imagine the day when you were off to school with your parents to collect your result of final exam of 9th class, in a state of fear about what is going to happen after the next half an hour you start to make plans on how to react in front of your parents if your result is not satisfactory, how to convince them by giving excuses. You made your plan and when you reach to school after that dreadful journey of half an hour, you come to know that your teacher has not arrived today and your result will be given tomorrow.

What will happen? The same trauma the same fear and the same planning you have to face and do on the next day also and this cycle will continue till the time you get your result in your hand.

With this experience of your dreadful and adventurous journey, you will be able to imagine a journey that a prisoner faces when he is sentenced to death punishment, a day of his death has been fixed by the court, but before that day or just before the execution of it the date of his execution gets postponed and next day is fixed.

The fear that we have faced in our life was just a fear of the result, but the fear and anxiety a prisoner of death sentence faces are called "Death row syndrome". 

CONCEPT OF DEATH ROW SYNDROME

It is a principle evolved by the Judiciary in relation to death sentences, according to which if there is a prolonged delay in execution of a death sentence then it would be an 'unjust, unfair and unreasonable' procedure to execute the sentence and is also a violation of the right to life of a prisoner who has been sentenced a death punishment because he'll die not only on the day when the execution is going to take place but will suffer a dreadful, fearful, a journey of anxiety, nervousness, stress, phobias, every minute till the execution takes place.

This journey of suffering is not of a day or two or not simply a half an hour journey which we had faced in our life, this journey may be of years and years, from the date when the court awards him the death sentence, then all legal remedies are exhausted, several writs and review petitions are made, request to the president in the form of mercy petition is made, during this time the date of execution gets delayed again and again and the trauma is to be suffered again and again.

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EFFECT ON CONVICTS

Mr Robert Johnson, a professor of criminology at the American university, conducted interviews with thirty-five men under sentence of death in Alabama. He found that the fear of execution gives rise to intense preoccupation for prisoners. It is a major concern of many death row inmates, a source of worry, anxiety, even a dread of the unknown. Some death row prisoners commented that they are scared twenty-four hours a day because they do not know what is going to happen. Others had recurring nightmares in which the ritual of execution is played out to its lethal conclusion. For some of the condemned men, this concern is constant, and not a day passes that they do not think about the death sentence. Similarly to Jhonson, Vogelman, a clinical psychologist, characterised death row incarceration by fear, anxiety and helplessness. The men expressed a fear of death, stating that "there is intense anxiety about the unknown".

INTERNATIONAL CONDEMNATION

Executing a mentally ill person is condemned widely by international law- the UN Commission on Human Rights urged all states "not to impose it on a person suffering from any mental disorder" and it has repeatedly urged India to enact domestic legislation that brings the practice in line with international legal standards.

The Indian Penal Code,1860(IPC) excludes such person from being convicted who at the time of committing the offence was of unsound mind and were incapable of knowing the nature of the act (SECTION 84).

But there is no such provision that talks about the situation at the time of execution of the death sentence if the convict is not in a stable mental condition.

JUDICIAL EVOLVEMENTS

The trauma which a convict of capital punishment faces has been categorically enumerated in our following Indian judgments:

• RAJENDRA PRASAD vs. STATE OF UTTAR PRADESH (1979)

Justice Krishna Iyer put the matter bluntly regarding a convict, who had lived with the impending hanging for six years by stating that: "He must, by now, be more a vegetable than a person and hanging a vegetable is not a death penalty".

Several Indian appellate courts take into account the length of time spent on death row while determining whether to quash the death sentence because of the "dehumanizing character of the delay".

• VATHEESWARAN vs. STATE OF TAMIL NADU (1983) (click to read whole judgment)

The court thought that the delay of two years would make it unreasonable to execute the death sentence. The cause of the delay was immaterial. The accused himself may be responsible for the dealy. In such a case, the appropriate relief would be to vacate the death sentence and substitute life imprisonment instead.

• TRIVENIBEN vs. STATE OF GUJARAT (1989) (click to read)

The court has now said that the delay which could be considered in considering the question of commutation of death sentence into one of life imprisonment could only be from the date the judgment by the apex court is pronounced, i.e., when the judicial process comes to an end. While considering the question of delay after the final verdict is pronounced, the time spent on petitions for review at the instance of the convicted person himself however shall not be considered.

• V SRIHARAN vs. UNION OF INDIA (2014) (click to read the whole judgment)

It cannot be said that the petitioners are under a legal obligation to produce evidence of their suffering and harm caused to them on account of prolonged delay. Such a pre-requisite would render the Fundamental Right beyond the reach of death row convicts.

CONCLUSION

By now we have come across the plight, which a death row convict suffers for years and years, but the sad part is that till now there is no established legal provision regarding which can commute this plight and safeguard the right to life and personal liberty of death row convicts.

It is only on the basis of facts and circumstances the judiciary analyse their plight as a mitigating factor when it comes to commute the death sentence because of prolonged delay and the agony they have suffered through is much more brutal than the actual punishment.

One of the ways out to curb this plight is to deduce a speedy way to execute a death sentence, without any waiver of legal remedies available to the convict, the other way is to dismiss and reject the frivolous or vexatious petitions by the convicts to delay the execution just to take advantage this as a mitigating factor.

To frame proper guidelines to jail authorities to take care of the mental health of the death row convicts can be a way out.

As a reader of this blog, you are also invited to share your views on this.

THANK YOU

Nikhil Tak (campus Law Centre, Delhi University)