On
this date, March 28, 2020, Lonnie David Franklin, Jr. AKA the Grim Sleeper, was
found unresponsive in his cell and was pronounced dead at 7:43 p.m. His cause
of death is pending the results of an autopsy; however, there were no signs of
trauma. Whenever a Killer die by any means, it is good news.
Lonnie David Franklin, Jr. (August 30, 1952 – March 28, 2020),
better known by the nickname Grim Sleeper, was an American serial
killer who was responsible for at least ten murders and one attempted
murder in Los Angeles, California. He was also convicted for rape and sexual
violence. Franklin earned his nickname when he appeared to have taken a
14-year break from his crimes, from 1988 to 2002.
In
July 2010, Franklin was arrested as a suspect, and, after many delays, his
trial began in February 2016. On May 5, 2016, the jury convicted him of killing
nine women and one teenage girl. On June 6, 2016, the jury recommended the death
penalty, and on August 10, 2016, the Los Angeles Superior Court sentenced
him to death for each of the ten victims named in the verdict. On March
28, 2020, he was found unresponsive in his cell at San Quentin State Prison and pronounced
dead.
On
March 28, 2020, Franklin was found unresponsive in his cell and was pronounced
dead at 7:43 p.m. His cause of death is pending the results of an autopsy;
however, there were no signs of trauma.
On
this date, March 20, 2020, The four adult convicts were hanged on 20 March 2020
at 5:30 am IST at Tihar Jail, and were declared dead after thirty minutes. They
were convicted in the 2012 Delhi gang rape case involved a rape and
fatal assault that occurred on 16 December 2012 in Munirka, a
neighbourhood in South Delhi. The incident took place when a 23-year-old
female physiotherapy intern, was beaten, gang raped,
and tortured
in a private bus in which she was travelling with her male friend. There were
six others in the bus, including the driver, all of whom raped the woman and
beat her friend. Eleven days after the assault she was transferred to a
hospital in Singapore
for emergency treatment but died two days later.
I
feel these four men deserved to die for what they did and I am satisfied that
the family members of the girl got justice served.
Four men are executed
over the 2012 gang rape and murder of a 23-year-old student in Delhi that
shocked the world
Four
men are executed over the 2012 gang rape and murder of a 23-year-old student in
Delhi that shocked the world
·Akshay Thakur, Vinay Sharma, Pawan Gupta and
Mukesh Singh were all executed
·The four were hanged in the high-security Tihar
prison in India's capital on Friday
·They raped and murdered Jyoti Singh, 23, on a
bus in 2012, sparking revulsion
Four men
who gang-raped and murdered 23-year-old student Jyoti Singh on a Delhi bus in
2012 have today been hanged.
Akshay
Thakur, Vinay Sharma, Pawan Gupta and Mukesh Singh were all hanged in the
high-security Tihar prison in Delhi early this morning, seven years after their
crime which sparked worldwide protests.
The victim's
mother Asha Devi, 51, declared that 'the beasts have
been hanged' as she made a V-for-victory-sign and said: 'Finally my daughter
got justice after seven years.'
The four
men raped and killed the physiotherapy student - who became known as Nirbhaya,
meaning 'Fearless' in India - in December 2012, and were executed after failing
in a series of appeals.
Akshay Thakur (top left), Vinay Sharma (top
right), Pawan Gupta (bottom left) and Mukesh Singh (bottom right) were all
hanged in the high-security Tihar prison in Delhi, India, on Friday for the
gang rape and murder of 23-year-old student Jyoti Singh in 2012
The case
caused an explosion of anger over the scale of sexual violence in India and
eventually led to tougher laws.
The
execution was India's first since 2015, but it sparked celebrations outside the
prison this morning as the hangings were carried out around 5.30am.
Speaking
outside the jail after the hangings the victim's mother Asha Devi told
reporters: 'We are satisfied that finally my daughter
got justice after seven years. The beasts have been hanged.'
Police
and paramilitary personnel were deployed to maintain security outside the
prison while the executions took place as groups with placards gathered by the
gates.
Asha Devi (left), the mother of the 23-year-old
student who was raped and murdered in 2012, makes a V-for-victory sign and
celebrates with her sister today as her daughter's killers were executed more
than seven years later
Speaking
just minutes after the executions, the victim's mother added: 'I hugged my daughter's photograph and told her we finally
got justice.'
Her
father added that his 'faith in the judiciary had been
restored'.
The
victim could not be named in India under Indian law but was
dubbed Nirbhaya - the fearless one - by the press until her mother said
she wanted Jyoti Singh's real name to be remembered.
She
died as a result of her injuries in a Singapore hospital 12 days after the
attack and six people were arrested for her murder.
The victim's parents Badrinath Singh (left) and
Asha Devi (centre) celebrated what they said was justice for their daughter's
murder today
As well as the four convicts who were executed, two
others involved include Ram Singh, who was found dead in jail in March 2013, in
an apparent suicide.
And another, who was just 17 at the time of
the attack and was released in 2015 after serving three years in a reform
facility, which is the maximum term possible for a juvenile in India.
All four of those who were executed had recently
filed petitions appealing for their sentences to be reduced to life
imprisonment.
But these were rejected by the Supreme Court.
The four had stood trial relatively quickly in
India's slow-moving justice system, their convictions and sentences handed down
less than a year after the crime.
People wave Indian flags as they stand outside
the gates of Tihar jail to celebrate the execution of the four rapists and
killers in a case which caused an explosion of anger in India
India's
top court upheld the guilty verdicts in 2017, finding the men's crimes had
created a 'tsunami of shock' among Indians.
India is among dwindling countries with death
penalty
India is among the minority of countries to retain the death
penalty.
Nearly three-quarters of world's 195 states have either
abolished the punishment or not carried it out over the past decade, according
to rights group Amnesty International.
By the end of 2018, 106 countries had completely abolished the
death penalty for all crimes, according to Amnesty.
Close to half of them were in Europe and Central Asia.
Another 36 countries retained the death penalty in law but had
not carried out executions for at least 10 years.
At least 690 executions were known to have taken place globally
in 2018, a decrease of 31 percent compared to 2017, Amnesty says.
The figure, the lowest it had recorded in the past decade, did
not however include the 'thousands' of executions believed to have been carried
out in China, which keeps such data secret.
China remains the top executioner, followed by Iran.
Last year's known executions were in 20 countries, with at least
253 recorded in Iran alone.
While this was the most in any another country, it was half the
number of 2017 following amendments to Iran's narcotics law, Amnesty's report
says.
Iran nonetheless accounted for more than one-third of the
executions recorded in 2018.
The following top executors were Saudi Arabia (149), Vietnam
(85), Iraq (52) and Egypt (43).
Botswana, Sudan, Taiwan and Thailand all resumed executions, but
only accounted for six of the global total.
Among the countries that increased their yearly executions were
Belarus (4), Japan (15), Singapore (13) and South Sudan (7).
For the 10th consecutive year, the United States was the only
country on the American continent to execute prisoners, putting to death 25 -
two more than in 2017.
Almost 400 people are on death row in India.
Its last execution was in 2015 when Yakub Memon, convicted for
the 1993 Mumbai bomb attacks that killed 257 people, was hanged in jail.
'The
four convicts were hanged together at 5.30 am,' said Sandeep Goel, head of the
Tihar Jail in New Delhi.
The
23-year-old student was attacked on December 16, 2012, after boarding a bus on
the way home from the cinema with a male friend.
The
six assailants knocked out the friend and dragged the woman to the back of the
vehicle where they raped and assaulted her with a metal rod.
After
an ordeal lasting more than an hour, she and the friend were dumped for
dead.
She was
studying physiotherapy and worked at a call centre. Her family had moved from a
rural area and her father earned around $100 a month as an airport baggage
handler.
Singh
survived long enough to identify her attackers and all six were arrested.
Four were convicted in 2013.
A
fifth, the suspected ringleader, was found dead in jail in a suspected suicide,
while the 17-year-old spent three years in a juvenile detention centre.
The
men on the bus - Ram Singh, Mukesh Singh, Vinay Sharma, Akshay Thakur and Pawan
Gupta - did menial jobs and lived in a slum in south Delhi.
Nearly
34,000 rapes were reported in India in 2018, according to official data. This is
considered the tip of the iceberg, with many more too scared to come forward.
But
the woman's ordeal, and the fact that she was part of a generation of young
women trying to break out of a still very traditional society, struck a chord.
Women's
activist, Kavita Krishnan, who took part in the huge protests said: 'It was like the bursting of a dam.
'It was not restricted to seeking revenge. Women said they do not
want to trade their freedom for safety... There was a social awakening of
society.'
It
led to tougher punishments for rapists including the death penalty for repeat
rape offenders.
The
executions may spark further celebrations on Friday despite government advice
to avoid crowds because of coronavirus, while politicians will likely rush to
express their satisfaction.
But
for Krishnan, this masks the government's continued failure to provide justice
and improve safety for women.
Almost
150,000 rape cases are awaiting trial in India's dysfunctional criminal justice
system.
The
government is 'trying to fix the public gaze on the gallows to divert attention
away from what it has failed to do,' Krishnan said.
CM Yogi
Welcomes Nirbhaya Convicts' Hanging, Calls For Creation Of A 'conscious
Society'
Politics
UP
CM Yogi Adityanath on Friday reacted to the hanging of Nirbhaya gangrape and
murder case convicts and called for the creation of conscious society for women
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi
Adityanath on Friday reacted to the hanging of all four death row convicts
of the Nirbhaya gang-rape and murder case by stating that a new chapter was
added to the inspiring pages of justice.
The Chief Minister's Tweet
roughly translates as, "Today, a new chapter has been added to the
inspiring pages of justice. Today is the day to be committed to the female
identity of the Indian public for the protection and respect of women. By
imbibing the spirit of a 'strong women-capable society', we must create a
conscious society towards women's interests."
Prime Minister
Narendra Modi on Friday reacted to the hanging of the Nirbhaya rape and murder
case convicts and stated that "justice had finally
prevailed." All four convicts in the Delhi 2012 rape and murder case
were finally hung to death in Tihar jail at 5.30 am after a long-drawn and
exhaustive judicial procedure. Responding to their hanging, PM Modi said
that ensuring the "dignity and safety of women was of utmost
importance." He also remarked that people should focus on building a
nation where there is "women empowerment and emphasis on equality and
opportunity."
Nirbhaya
Convicts Hanged
Seven years
and three months after, on March 20 the four convicts in the Delhi 2012 rape
and murder case were hanged to death in Tihar jail. This was the first time
that four men were executed together in Tihar Jail, South Asia's largest prison
complex that houses more than 16,000 inmates.
A guard of not
less than 10 constable, wardens, and two head constables, head wardens or an
equal number from the prison armed guard, were also present, it states.
Meanwhile, hundreds of people had gathered outside the Tihar central jail ahead
of the execution on Friday morning to celebrate.
.png){kind=link}