On Friday, 29 May 2009, the life of Saudi national Ahmed Al-Shamlani Al-Anzi ended when he was beheaded in a public execution in Riyadh. Shortly after his beheading, his head was then sewed back on to his body and then the body was strung up on a pole for public display. Why did such an unusual act happen to this Saudi man?
Al-Anzi was a convicted killer who coldly and calculatedly killed an 11 year old boy whom he had kidnapped for “malicious purposes.” When the young boy’s father came to investigate and retrieve his son, Al-Anzi killed the father as well…by axing him to death. Al-Anzi also resisted arrest from the police threatening them with a knife.
According to the Ministry of Interior, it was further revealed that Al-Anzi had been previously convicted of other crimes which include possession of pornographic videos and sodomy. Given the heinous nature of the crimes he had committed, it was decided that Al-Anzi would be publicly executed and then his body would remain on public display via what the Saudis term by ‘crucifixion’ as an example and a deterrent to others warning that the Saudi government takes such violent crimes seriously. The term crucifixion does not mean “nailed” to a cross such as in the Biblical term, but rather that a body would be strung up and attached to either a pole or a tree in full public view.
This is not an act that the Saudi government decides upon lightly. Nor is this a procedure that is routinely followed. However if the act is considered heinous enough then this procedure will be followed. In speaking with one Saudi on this decision, he advised that this is the second time in his 50 plus years that he was aware of a body being put on display via Saudi Crucifixion.
Now some factions state that this execution and crucifixion is a human rights violation. I personally do not agree with that perspective. After all, America also has a death penalty and in some cases, other individuals in addition to prison officials are allowed to witness the death of a prisoner. And how many times have individuals who’ve been deemed as terrorists or high value targets (HVT) will have their graphic photograph published all around the world when they have been killed? I am also confident that if one sees a body such as Al-Anzi’s it would have a preventive effect on future crimes in Saudi Arabia.
So in closing this post, what are your views? Do you agree with the actions taken by the government of Saudi Arabia? Or do you believe that these actions are a violation of human rights? And when you share your view, to further stimulate discussion and exchanges, please quantify your answer too!
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There is no evidence that the death penalty or awareness of it deters murderers, pedophiles or rapists. In fact the opposite is true, there are fewer homicides in states with no death penalty. For this reason, among others, countries have increasingly dropped the death penalty. The USA is the only Western country to retain capital punishment and Harris County (Houston) has the highest rate of executions.
Pedophiles are not in control, and are not deterred by threats, nor are sadists. For both the treatment/punishment of choice is orchiectomy (surgical castration) which is effective for them but not for other rapists who are less motivated by sexual compulsions than by anger, and power. The next best is chemical castration (with depo-provera) but requires compliance with long acting injections. Both for moral reasons are voluntary, not compulsory, in the USA. However pedophiles do volunteer for the treatment, as an alternative to imprisonment.
The other problem with the death penalty, besides its failure to deter, is the fallibility of any legal system, and in particular the judicially suspect legal systems of many of the countries that have the death penalty (also allowing confessions obtained by torture, for example, or a lack of transparency, or a system of bribery).
So, I am 100% against the death penalty and crucifixion.
I have never ever in real life seen someone being killed and I would like to keep it that way. As for having someone’s dead body on display for everyone to see, I don’t think that is needed at all. I think the death penalty is public enough & more than enough when it comes to scaring the heck out of people. As for my opinion on the death penalty: As a rule how it is decided upon whehther or not someone should get the death penalty, I think is fair (hear me out, you don’t have to agree with me) It offers the chance for the relatives of the victim to decide if they’d like to forgive or not… I have never been put in a situation where someone killed a loved one of mine(God forbid I ever have to deal with anything like this)hence, I would not like to go with my emotion and say it is completely inhumane, and disregard the emotions of the victims’ family. If I can truly let someone live for killing a loved one of mine, then hurray for me but what about the people that can’t?
@daifuku = thanks very much for sharing your candid view. I do know of a few individuals in Saudi who have witnessed a public execution and most not by choice but being in the wrong place at the wrong time. All of them say it is an image they have been unable to erase from their mind.
I think the display is unnecessary because the beheading style execution is graphic enough.
If you take the life of another in cold blooded murder, then you have forsaken your own right to life and you have proven you are a threat to society. Of course the accused has the right to a trial with a lawyer, and the justice system MUST be uncorrupt AND transparent. Proof should be beyond a reasonable doubt. The death penalty is not archaic, rather, brutal murders of innocent humans are. If the family of the victim wishes for the guilty murderer to serve life in prison instead of execution, then their wishes should be followed.
These are all my opinions of course, and it is fine if people disagree with me. As far as the Saudi style beheading, I’ve read the other American Bedu post about it, and to me it is a very freaky concept, but at least it is quick & you are assured that the person is dead.
Displaying dead bodies whether executed or murdered etc does nothing for people anymore…the nightly news and all the killing going on in the world supposedly for righteous reasons has made people numb to yet one more death. His body might have been fodder for curiosity for about a day or two…after that I bet people didnt even notice it.
first, I guess i’m a little suprised at using what the US does as a moral equivalency – that the US has the death penalty and sometimes lets people other than prison guards and the victims families to view is hardly a demarcator of what constitutes a right; i think we can set the bar far higher than that!
the problem i have with the death penalty is the decision that is made. There is a reason why a deliberate intended murder is judged more harshly than say – killing the person you found in the act of raping a child. The difference is that the decision was made to kill in one case, and consciously followed out. In the other example, there was no plan; but a response to a hideous situation. In one case, the killer might be guilty of murder, in the other, guilty of manslaughter.
The thing is, it’s the decision that is made to kill that is considered most reprehensible. To decide that it is ok for you to kill; to plan how to and then carry out – this is regarded as the worst form of murder. And what is the death penalty other than the state determining that it – in the particular case – has the right to kill someone; planning the execution and then carrying it out. If we really think that it’s choosing to kill that is what’s reprehensible, how is it ok for the state to do the same? it’s either wrong, or it’s not wrong..
As to the display and deterrence; I’m with Chiara on the death penalty not working as a deterrent.. the display… Imagine that it gives children nightmares.
Is there an Islamic basis for the disrespect shown for a dead body? I have never heard of such a thing allowed under Islamic law.
The respect of the dead body is a very important thing is Islam, hence the reason for burying them so quickly.
Sounds to me like another unIslamic practice.
The practice sounds like what they used to do hundreds of years ago in Europe……..being hung, drawn and quartered and then put on display as an example.
I think that the death penalty is barbaric, although not quite as barbaric as the idea of blood money where a certain class of people can get away with murder if they have enough money and the victim’s family is poor. If this crucified man had had money he would be free but since he didn’t he gets to go on display as an example? Boggles my mind, really.
In the US the death penalty is usually a state issue and not a federal one. There is no obvious correlation between the death penalty and crime rates. New York Cities murder rate went down without any executions (New York still has a death penatly on its books but it hasn’t been used in over 40 years). If there is any correlation it is between an ex governor who happily signed death warrants and the US abandoning common decency in its practices abroad.
I remember when I was in the states some years back… one of the courts in Texas sentenced the death penalty for one of the criminals. Few days later, the Pop contacted the governor of Texas (I believe it was bush then) and asked him to stop sentencing the death penalty. The Governor; however, did not listen to the Pop. I remembered this story after reading Chiara’s comment about Harris County in Texas being Number 1 when it comes to the highest rates of executions!!!! If the pop had known….!
On a different point.. what is considered appropriate or scary or violent in one country might not be viewed in the same way in another country. Likewise, what is appropriate in Europe or the states does not necessarily apply to Saudi Arabia. With that being said… those who mentioned that the death penalty does not deter crimes, that might be true in some regions in this world, but it is NOT necessarily true all over the world. I read in a book which name I can’t remember now that Iran passed a law that says the death penalty would be enforced for anyone in possession of 20 grams or more of heroin. The book says that it was almost impossible to find this type of occurrence in Iran after that law was passed.
Another point which was raised in this discussion was… what if the death penalty was sentenced on the wrong person? That is a good argument, and I’ve also read somewhere that over the last 100 years, the death penalty was enforced on the wrong people for 75 cases!!!!!!!
Generally speaking, I am not for the capital punishment (or crucifixion for that matter)… but as a Muslim, and since the capital punishment and crucifixion are practiced in the shariah, I would say that I believe in them but only for the most extreme cases.. not only to deter crimes… but also to get rid of some utterly baaaad people.. like someone who kidnapped, raped and killed more than one person.
100% against the death penalty. Maybe it’s a deterrant to future crimes but my personal opinion is if you can’t bring something back to life, you cannot take it’s life.
Maybe life in hellish jail is what a murderer should get. Why kill him and end his misery, throw him in jail and let him languish for the rest of his life. No freedom is a horrible punishment to live with.
I can’t really say I’m against death penalty, in my country it does not exist, but sometimes when you hear of some crimes, you wish we had. But if there was.. My position is not very clear in that issue.
What I really do not agree is with displaying a death body. Everybody deserves respect. Even criminals. That kind of punishment reminds me europe’s epoque of henry VIII
While normal people may be traumatized by viewing executions and dead bodies, serial or multiple killers, professional killers, pedophiles and sadists are undeterred (the crimes of Al-Anzi were multiple murders or a sadistic nature, pedophilic sodomy, and confinement). This research has been reproduced across cultures. Drug traffickers seem to have a better capacity for economics. Otherwise I agree with Jael and Nader’s points about not upholding the US practice in this regard as the gold standard or universal paradigm.
The points about the disrespect for the dead body, even that of a heinous criminal, and the permissibilty or such punishments according to Sharia law, would be debatable by Islamic scholars, I’m sure. eg. at what point if any is human behaviour so reprehensible that it merits public shaming or the criminal by displaying the dead body, or public terror by displaying the dead body if there is no proven effect of deterrance of those likely to commit similar crimes; whether even if permissible these punishments should be recommended or obligatory, etc.
The point of reducing crime by a specific criminal is also debatable since it is true that pedophiles have multiple victims, as do by definition multiple and serial killers. On the other hand if it is true that there is a genetic or congenital component to this type of criminal behaviour, others will be born in their place. At which point it may become more important how one wishes to conduct oneself as a society.
As a male psychiatry professor once said to me, if it weren’t for the fact that men (usually) decide the laws, mete out the punishments, and perform the surgeries, pedophiles would be castrated by orchiectomy (surgical removal of the testicles), stopping their crimes.
Or as Radha said, a true life sentence in jail (no parole) would be a viable alternative to the death penalty, and would allow for appeal and dna or whatever new scientific proof to spare the wrongfully convicted.
I generally tend to lean left in political things, but when it comes to the death penalty, I am not entirely against it. However, as previously stated here, it seems that it’s not so much a deterrant anymore. We see death and brutality on TV all the time, and have become numb to it.
Now, given the atrocious nature of this man’s crimes, I say kill the b*stard and be done with him. It won’t bring the father or the little boy back, but it will prevent future victims of this horrible person. I don’t think stringing his dead body up for all to see will do much good though.
Public sympathy here seems to favor the one whose head has been severed and whose body is put on public display.
I daresay this sympathy would reverse itself, were the suffering of the innocent victim made equally visible.
As for the death penalty as deterrent, it certainly is a deterrent, if only to the one who killed in the first place.
Why should the resources of society be wasted on a keeping a murderer alive? Killing is morally wrong by all standards, but so is maintaining the ife of a murderer who would murder again if given the chance.
(This comment assumes that the accused is guilty and unrepentent, in other words, a sociopath.)
“Why should the resources of society be wasted on a keeping a murderer alive? ”
A good question, in countries like the US with an extensive appeals process for capital cases and a system that pays the lawyer’s fees for criminals, it is often more expensive to execute than to imprison.
@ Chiara—I agree with all your points.
Really, public execution does not prevent or decrease crimes at all. In fact, places which have higher rates of capital punishment in turn have higher rates of capital crimes. In Connecticut there is the death penalty by lethal injection butit has been used only once. The crime rate is failry low except in some areas such as Bridgeport but is still not bad at all.
One who has a sociopathic disorder does not and will not think of the consequences of his or her crime. I think it is the developement frontal lobe or pre-frontal lobe that determines ones conscience, so if one does not have a conscience they are not going to care about the outcome of their crime–PERIOD.
About the death penalty, I agree with you 100%. I think that the law needs to draw a line. “If you go beyond this point, you have performed deeds so abhorrent that the only way we can begin to punish you is with the death penalty.” Does it serve as a deterrent? I’m not sure. But again, the point here is to draw a line–to define the point where certain deeds become unforgivable.
That said, execution should only occur when there is little or no doubt about the suspect’s guilt, and only for the most severe crimes. As for the crucifixion…I’m less than enthusiastic about it. Public execution–specifically, people going to watch people get killed to have a good time–strikes me as rather barbaric. Killing someone is a serious deed, no matter how much they deserve the penalty, and should be treated as such. Execution isn’t a spectator sport. At the most, the only viewers should be police officers, close family and friends of the accused and the victims, and maybe some reporters if the execution holds regional/national significance.
But your crucifixion seems to be more along the lines of bodily mutilation and public display. Again, such acts can be used as a way to show public disapproval, but personally speaking, I think this is taking it a little too far. Bodily mutilation is disgusting–it shows an irreverence for the dead. As for hanging the body in public, I think that does a disservice to any civilized country, because who wants to see a dead body when they’re shopping for groceries? Imagine taking your children to the shuk and there’s a dead body on display. That’s not something I’d want my children to see.
The closest example I’m willing to accept is when the Israelis cremated Eichmann and spread his ashes over the Mediterranean. But still, such acts should be reserved for the worst of the worst–mass murderers, war criminals, etc.
An eye for an eye until the whole world is blind.
I am not usually in favour of the death penalty, but this man thoroughly deserved it. There are times when the full punishment under Shar’ia law should be applied, although I don’t think displaying the body is part of authentic Shar’ia.
Before anybody jumps on me, I do not support Shar’ia law, because it is never applied the way it was meant to be.
I worry that this breaks that taboo that most people have about not seeing dead bodies outside of funerals, in very non-violent and controlled circumstances. Is there not a risk of desensitization to a dead body, likely with some pretty nasty wounds due to the process?
I support the death penalty, however it is gruesome having his head sewn to his body, who would want to carry such a job?
You lose your human rights when you infringe on your victim’s rights. An eye for an eye is justice.
Amnesty International’s report on the death penalty in Saudi Arabia makes it clear how difficult it is to condone the death penalty in a country with severe problems in the judiciary, and in the social structuring of criminality. The section on the legal system is entitled: “THE LEGAL PROCESS: SECRET, SUMMARY AND UNFAIR”.
The section on the differential application of the law is entitled “Death by Discrimination” with the subtitles “Foreign Workers and the Poor”, and “Women on Death Row” indicating the 3 groups disproportionately executed.
http://www.amnesty.org/en/news-and-updates/report/saudi-arabia-executions-target-foreign-nationals-20081014
If it was my son, and my husband that where killed, I would also want the man dead. Society has no need for someone like that around –NEVER–EVER! As for the displaying of the body, I have (being a convert to Islam) never heard of something like that being in the shariah and cant imagine that its acceptable, as we are not to abuse the dead.-God knows best
I was going to ask a knowledgeable friend about whether this is something found in Islamic shariah, but she said that the news report she read (in Arabic) said that the man was hanged, and then his body was left hanging for a few more hours (which is not that unusual). I searched and found news reports saying that, as well as some saying that his head was sewn on (which seems bizarre), as this post says… So what actually happened?
From what I read, what happened was as American
Bedu described. He was beheaded or partially beheaded, the head was re-attached and he was hung from a pole on display because of the heinousness of his crimes. He was not crucified in the Christian sense of nailed or hung on a cross until death. This is part of sharia law, as an extreme punishment for extremely heinous crimes.
Re: Al-Anzi’s execution from:
http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/meast/05/30/saudi.arabia.execution/
“Chirouf, the Saudi Arabian researcher for Amnesty International, said his understanding of how the Saudi government carries out crucifixion jibed with Saudi Press Agency’s account.”
“Chirouf said those crucified are beheaded first and then their heads are sewn back on their bodies. Then, the corpse is mounted on a pole or a tree.”
” The English-language Saudi Gazette newspaper said the body was placed on public display throughout the evening and Chirouf said it was his understanding that the body was to be displayed for a few hours.”
I do not understand the Shariah law enough to know whether the public display of a body is under Shariah or is more of a cultural practice in Saudi Arabia.
I also wondered who would have the job of resewing the head….
PS in Sunni criminal law crucifixion is exposure of the body after execution; in Shi’ite criminal law it is a form of execution where the criminal is tied to a cross (or x frame) until death. It is a punishment for hadd crimes (those with a fixed penalty eg. apostasy, theft).
Good article “The Islamization of Criminal Law”
http://www.jstor.org/stable/1570932?seq=1
Apparently a doctor who is present at executions and amputations does the sewing, and will also do it for families who wish the head sewn back on for burial.
Guys… guys….. it’s in the quraan. Read 005:033
“The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His Messenger, and strive with might and main for mischief through the land is: execution, or crucifixion, or the cutting off of hands and feet from opposite sides, or exile from the land: that is their disgrace in this world, and a heavy punishment is theirs in the Hereafter”
Another translation..
“The just retribution for those who fight GOD and His messenger, and commit horrendous crimes, is to be killed, or crucified, or to have their hands and feet cut off on alternate sides, or to be banished from the land. This is to humiliate them in this life, then they suffer a far worse retribution in the Hereafter.”
Nadar–thanks, I couldn’t find the reference to the exact Quranic surah and ayat.
To your Yusuf Ali translation and the other one (?) I would add:
005.033
PICKTHAL: The only reward of those who make war upon Allah and His messenger and strive after corruption in the land will be that they will be killed or crucified, or have their hands and feet on alternate sides cut off, or will be expelled out of the land. Such will be their degradation in the world, and in the Hereafter theirs will be an awful doom;
SHAKIR: The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His messenger and strive to make mischief in the land is only this, that they should be murdered or crucified or their hands and their feet should be cut off on opposite sides or they should be imprisoned; this shall be as a disgrace for them in this world, and in the hereafter they shall have a grievous chastisement,
NB the role of repentance:
005.034
YUSUFALI: Except for those who repent before they fall into your power: in that case, know that Allah is Oft-forgiving, Most Merciful.
PICKTHAL: Save those who repent before ye overpower them. For know that Allah is Forgiving, Merciful.
SHAKIR: Except those who repent before you have them in your power; so know that Allah is Forgiving, Merciful.
@Nader – thanks!!
I know that crucifixion is a punishment in the Quran, but it’s not done AFTER the person has already been killed, is it? I think that word might be the wrong translation in this case; it seems that they hung his body to be seen publicly, and didn’t do what we think of as a crucifixion.
Munaqabah–as above, crucifixion in Sunni Islam=displaying the dead body; in Shia Islam crucifixion=tying the body to an X frame or “cross” until death occurs.
“The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His Messenger, and strive with might and main for mischief through the land is: execution, or crucifixion, or the cutting off of hands and feet from opposite sides, or exile from the land: that is their disgrace in this world, and a heavy punishment is theirs in the Hereafter”…”
The irony here is that just about every head of every so called Islamic nation today could be accused of spreading mischief in the land…hmmm?
Chiara, that’s why I don’t think “crucifixion” is the right translation, because it brings to mind something different from what they actually did.
Munaqabah–crucifixion prior to and aside from Christianity refers to a painful slow form of execution on a “cross” of any form: a pole (crux simplex), X T t yY, etc.
If the criminal is partially beheaded then perhaps the display is also a residual dying, or if fully beheaded then a further display of dying (as the dead body would go through further dying, eg organ death, cell death, rigor mortis eventually setting in).
Perhaps it is also one of those words that is retained but evolves in meaning over time.
Currently, it is a confusing term since most Western readers would need to be reminded each time that this was not a Christian Jesus-like crucifixion, but a display of a dead or dying body, or a non-Christian method of public execution (as is was for Jesus–who was executed according to the Roman practice of his time).
Coolred– maybe they will repent (Quran 5: 34)?
well fromt he article in not so many words it sounds as though tis man may have kidnapped the boy for rape. and then killed him and his father…he is a animal.
i always go back and forth on the death penalty…but then i hear stories like this..and realize there are some people that cannot be saved from themselves..and are usless to everyone else
“The Saudi Crucifixion – Human Rights Violation or Not?”
In what other country would such a question even be asked? In what other country would such a thing NOT be considered barbarity?
It may be barbarity but one can hardly call it a ‘human rights violation’ when it is done to an already dead body. If it is recommended in the Koran, that doesn’t make it anything other than a barbarous practice.
A question. Does the Arabic word that is translated as crucifixion actually mean crucifixion? The practice as described is certainly not crucifixion as we know it, but words to get mangled when they cross linguistic boundaries.
It would be important to remember that the cross in various forms is a universal shape and pre-dated Christianity. That it has come in certain shapes to be associated with the life and death of Jesus as the Christian saviour does not eliminated other uses and meanings.
Crucifixion–fixing to a cross of whatever specific shape until death–was a Roman form of deliberately slow execution, and had nothing to do with Christianity. The Romans got it from the Greeks, and the Persians also used it for centuries. It was abolished in the Christian world as form of execution only in the 4th century as a tribute to Jesus.
Someone else will have to address the actual Arabic word, but as the Bible exists in Arabic presumably the same word has both the secular meaning as a means of execution, and the religious meaning in the Christian Bible as well as the Sharia meaning in the Quran.
Death penalty is barbaric by default. The way it’s executed in Saudi Arabia is extremely barbaric. Beheading in the third millennium?!
The “death penalty as a deterrent” argument has been proven wrong repeatedly by many countries that abolished it and some that re-introduced it after years of abolition.
Forget beheading of a violent criminal, how about flogging of a 13 year old girl? Is that human rights violation enough for you?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1244689/Saudi-girl-13–sentenced-90-lashes-took-mobile-phone-school.html
I’m curious as to how many countries around the world now still institute the death penalty? The US, at least in some states, is among countries which still use the death penalty.
And stay tuned, I have an upcoming post specific to the lashing of the 13 year old girl so I request comments be forth held until that post is published.
Regards, Carol