Legislator defends RP executions

Legislator defends RP executions

MANILA (DPA): A Philippine legislator assured critics of the
death penalty yesterday that the country's capital punishment law
contained safety provisions against reckless sentencing.

The remarks by Senator Ernesto Herrera, author of the law re-
instating capital punishment in 1994, came as opposition mounted
against the first execution scheduled for next year.

Herrera said that among such safety provisions were explicit
statements that death was the most severe of a range of penalties
for heinous crimes.

The first person scheduled for execution next year is Leo
Echegaray, a carpenter who was convicted of repeatedly raping his
step-daughter.

At least 414 convicts have been sentenced to die by lethal
injection since 1994. So far, the Supreme Court has confirmed
only six death sentences.