While the government has gradually decreased the number of crimes eligible for execution, While public opinion in China regarding the death penalty isn’t well documented, it is believed to have general support. The 2013 total was about three times the number of people executed in all the other countries of the world combined,īut far lower than the total in 2002, when China executed about 12,000 people. The official totals are considered secret, so rights groups and legal expertsĬan only make estimates based on published sentences and details released in Chinese media reports. In June, the Supreme People’s Court overturned the death sentence for a woman convicted of murdering her abusive husband.Ĭhina is believed to have executed about 2,400 people last year, according to the Dui Hua Foundation, a San Francisco-based human rights group. In 2007, China’s highest court, the Supreme People’s Court, began reviewing death penalty cases following a series of well-publicized, flawed convictions, including the 2005 case of She Xianglin, a man convicted of killing his missing wife, who later returned to her hometown alive. But the move signaled a willingness on the part of the authorities to restrict capital punishment. That move was seen as largely symbolic, as the crimes were generally nonviolent acts for which theĭeath penalty was rarely used. In 2011 it dropped the death penalty for 13 offenses. Or a person on duty from performing his duties,” “fabricating rumors to mislead others during wartime,” and smuggling ammunition, counterfeit currency, nuclear materials or weapons, Xinhua said.Ĭhina now lists 55 crimes for which offenders can be executed. The crimes include counterfeiting, fraudulent fund-raising, forcing others into prostitution, “obstructing a commander The proposal, which was put before the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress on Monday, would change the maximum punishment for nine crimes to life imprisonment, Xinhua, the state news agency, The Chinese government is considering a reduction in the number of crimes eligible for capital punishment, part of a long-term trend that has seen a decline in executions, though China still leads the world in the number She Xianglin being escorted out of a court in Hubei Province on April 13, 2005, following his acquittal for the murder of his wife, who turned up alive after he had served 11 years in prison.
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