Whether in ancient times or in modern times, the death penalty has always been the most severe punishment, and it is also known as "capital punishment". However, with the development of human civilization and science and technology, people's thinking and values have also changed, and this punishment, which has been produced as early as the barbaric era of human beings, has been questioned by many people, and many countries have abolished the death penalty.
To this day, there is no agreement on whether the death penalty should be abolished. According to relevant statistics, about 70% of countries have abolished the death penalty, such as the United States, the United Kingdom, etc., while 30% of countries, including China, Japan, North Korea, Thailand and other countries, still maintain the death penalty system.
Among the many countries where the death penalty is present, there is one country that is more peculiar, and it is Japan. In Japan, it is not known that it will be executed today until the day of execution. Isn't it very peculiar, let's take a closer look at the Japanese death penalty.
To this day, Japan still uses and only uses the ancient punishment of hanging, hanging sounds much less painful than shooting and injecting poison, but in fact, the pain caused by hanging to prisoners is much higher than that of shooting, etc. When executed, prisoners will shake violently, and some people's bodies are cut in half, and they are physically and mentally tortured, which is why Japan still carries out the death penalty by hanging.
Although Japan still retains the death penalty, it rarely imposes the death penalty in judgments, such as the death penalty that may be imposed after killing more than three people, and the Japanese Supreme Court also believes that "the death penalty is only applicable to those who commit extremely bad crimes." ”
It is precisely because of Japan's strict requirements for the imposition of the death penalty that judges have to repeatedly deliberate before pronouncing judgments to ensure the accuracy of judgments.
At the same time, after the death sentence is completed, there is still a long appeal process to go, and when the prisoner has exhausted the opportunity to appeal, the Minister of Justice must sign the execution order before it can be executed.
So much so that a scholar who has long studied Japanese culture said that because the retrial system stipulated in Japan's Criminal Procedure Law gives prisoners too much right to appeal, as long as the prisoner does not want to carry out the death penalty, he can change the pattern and file a request for appeal or pardon for various reasons, so as to delay the execution of the death penalty.
Moreover, the system in which the execution of the death penalty can only be carried out by the Minister of Justice by signing an execution order makes the entire execution process even more slow. During their tenure, many ministers of justice, due to their political views and religion and other reasons, were extremely reluctant to act as "executioners" and refused to sign execution orders, resulting in very few cases of actual executions in Japan.
Therefore, before the execution order is signed, the death row inmates can only wait in prison, because the long waiting time will give the prisoners a deep physical and mental torture, and they will never know whether they will be told to go on the road tomorrow.
When the execution order is signed, neither the executor nor the prisoner knows the specific date of execution in advance, and it is only on the morning of the execution that it will be executed today.
There are two reasons for this:
1. Give play to humanitarianism and avoid giving too much pressure and panic to prisoners.
2. Prevent prisoners from committing suicide in advance, so as to ensure that prisoners receive due punishment.
In fact, in the past, Japan would still inform in advance, but since October 3, 1975, when the criminals at the Fukuoka Detention Center committed suicide by cutting their wrists with a razor before execution, Japan did so on the same day. Therefore, of the two reasons, the second is more important.
After being told, some of the prisoners behaved calmly, some jumped like thunder, and some sat paralyzed on the ground, but no matter how they reacted, they could not escape death today.
Death row inmates are first taken to the confessional room, which is made of wooden floors and has a large coffee table and two chairs in the middle of the room. A deep wall was dug into the wall of the room, and in this space was placed a Shrine with a statue of the Buddha for the prisoners to repent. During this time, prisoners can also communicate with religious people to reduce their psychological stress. When the confession is completed, the death row inmate is asked to walk down the corridor to the death penalty site.
Death penalty fields are generally divided into an anterior room, an execution room, a control button room, and an external viewing room in Japan. The prisoner is first taken to the front room, where the prisoner is named, the prison director reads out the execution order, which is the last stop in the prisoner's life, and if the prisoner asks for it, he can also repent again here. Because most of the front rooms are adjacent to the execution room, the two rooms are usually separated by a large curtain.
The prisoner then entered the execution chamber, put on an eye mask, put on handcuffs and tied his feet. Then the three executors press the button at the same time, and the execution is completed.
For japan's death penalty system, everyone's views are generally very different, there are supports and oppositions, I don't know how you think about this system, welcome to discuss in the comment area.
Reference: Places of State Secret Execution: The Death Penalty in Japan