Criminal Law: Death Penalty in Kenya

Capital punishment, also known as thedeath penalty, is a government-sanctioned practice whereby a person is killed by the state as a punishment for a crime. Thesentencethat someone be punished in such a manner is referred to as adeath sentence, whereas the act of carrying out the sentence is known as an execution.

Crimes that are punishable by death are known ascapital crimesorcapital offences, and they commonly include offences such asmurder,treason,espionage,war crimes,crimes against humanityandgenocide. Etymologically, the termcapital(lit. "of the head", derived via theLatincapitalisfromcaput, "head") in this context alluded to execution by beheading.

Capital punishmenthas been practiced inKenyasince beforeindependenceand is still provided for under Kenyan law. No executions have been carried out in Kenya since 1987,When Hezekiah Ochuka and Pancras Oteyo Okumu were hanged for treason.

In 2009, Kenya commuted all death sentences to life imprisonment, impactingover 4000 death row inmates. The move was made to compel these prisoners to work, something condemned men are exempted.Despite the lack of executions,death sentencesare still passed in Kenya. In July 2013, Ali Babitu Kololo was sentenced to death for his role in the murder and kidnapping of two British tourists, and in 2014 a nurse received a death sentence after being convicted of carrying out anabortionon a woman whosubsequently died.

History
Capital punishment was introduced in Kenya in 1893 by the colonial government;the practice was uncommon in pre-colonial communities, which placed a high value on human life.In general, most African communities did not imposea death sentence on an individual unless as a last resort for an offender who had repeatedly "made themselves dangerous beyond the limits of endurance of their fellows".The Penal Code as created by the British required a mandatory death penalty for murder,treason and armed robbery. Numerous executions, documented as 1,090 in number, were carried out by the British colonial government during theMau Mau Uprising.

Afterthe 1982 coup d'état attempt,Hezekiah Ochuka, Pancras Oteyo Okumu and two other masterminds of the coup were convicted of treason, sentenced to death and consequently hanged. They were the last people executed in Kenya to date.[6]In 2010, theCourt of Appealrepealed the mandatory death sentence for murder inMutiso v. Republic, the third national court in common-law Africa to do so.[8]In 2016, President Uhuru Kenyatta commuted the death sentences of 2747 inmates on death row to life imprisonment, as was done by President Mwai Kibaki 7 years previously, where he commuted the sentences of 4000 inmates on death row to life imprisonment.