The Singapore Court of Appeal has dismissed death row inmate Nagaenthran Dharmalingam’s final appeal to set aside his conviction and death sentence, ahead of a scheduled execution date tomorrow.
One of Nagaenthran’s lawyers, N Surendran, took to Twitter to announce the verdict of the appeal filed by the 33-year-old's mother, Panchalai Supermaniam, yesterday.
"Nagaenthran’s final appeal was just dismissed in appalling circumstances.
"His mother’s pleas to be allowed to appoint a lawyer was ignored by the court," said Surendran.
"Verdict given without hearing from Nagaen’s side at all - utter and barbaric disregard of rule of law. The Nazis did this too," he said.
Lawyers for Liberty chief coordinator Zaid Malek yesterday said Panchalai had personally filed the legal challenge with the help of friends and activists after being unable to obtain the services of a lawyer in Singapore.
Surendran had yesterday claimed a conflict of interest involving Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon who presided over and dismissed Nagaenthran’s appeals.
Mentally impaired
Nagaenthran is a mentally impaired Malaysian, who was sentenced for a drug trafficking offence in Singapore.
He has been on death row for more than a decade for trafficking about 42.7g of heroin into Singapore, which has some of the world's toughest narcotics laws.
His lawyers said he has a mild intellectual disability due to his lower-than-average IQ of 69.
Nagaenthran was scheduled to hang on Nov 10 last year but was granted a stay of execution on Nov 8 after his Singaporean lawyer M Ravi filed an 11th-hour constitutional challenge.
Although the Singapore High Court dismissed the challenge, it allowed an appeal to the Court of Appeal.
The appeal was supposed to be heard in November but was postponed to March this year when Nagaenthran tested positive for Covid-19 on Nov 9, 2021.
However, his appeal was again rejected on March 29 this year. - Mkini
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