Friday, August 21, 2015

PAKISTANI PARAPLEGIC TO BE HANGED SITTING IN WHEELCHAIR

Authorities say that by sitting in a wheelchair, convicted murderer Abdul Basit meets the requirement for the condemned to support his own weight on the scaffold

BarkGrowlBite | August 21, 2015

In 2009, Abdul Basit, 43, was convicted if murder in a Pakistani court. In 2010, while confined in Faisalabad Prison, he came down with tuberculosis which left him paralyzed from the waist down.

Pakistan lifted a moratorium on the death penalty after seven Taliban gunmen opened fire inside a school in Peshawar in December 2014, killing 145 people, including 132 schoolchildren. Basit was placed at the head of the line of those waiting to be executed.

On July 29, Abdul was handed a ‘black warrant’ which signifies that his execution was imminent. His final appeal hearing is set for Tuesday and if that fails, he will be hanged soon thereafter.

Prison officials believe that with Abdul sitting in a wheelchair for the hanging, they will meet the requirement for the condemned to support his own weight on the scaffold.

The anti-death penalty groups are having a severe case of apoplexy over Abdul’s pending hanging.

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