Van Tuong Nguyen
Encyclopedia
Van Tuong Nguyen baptised
Caleb, was an Australian from Melbourne, Victoria convicted of drug trafficking in Singapore
. A Vietnamese Australian
, he was also addressed as Nguyen Tuong Van in the Singaporean media, his name in Vietnamese custom
.
Drug trafficking
carries a mandatory death sentence
under Singapore's Misuse of Drugs Act
, and despite pleas for clemency
from the Australian government
, Amnesty International
, the Holy See
, as well as other individuals and groups, he was executed by hanging
at 6:07 am SST
on 2 December 2005 at Changi Prison
(22:07 UTC
, 1 December).
at Songkhla
in Thailand
to Vietnamese
parents. He did not know his father until 2001 when he travelled from the United States to Australia. His mother, Kim, is Vietnamese
and migrated, like boat people
, to Australia shortly after the boys' birth. She married a Vietnamese Australian in 1987, who beat them often, according to Nguyen. His education was at St Joseph's Primary School in Springvale
and Mount Waverley Secondary College
.
After leaving school at 18, he intended to study at Deakin University
, but financial difficulties led him to work as a store clerk, door-to-door salesman, computer sales and research marketing. He started his own computer sales business in 1999. After his brother Khoa got into legal trouble, Nguyen wound up the business. He then found a sales, research and marketing job and earned between A$
1500 to A$2500 a month (depending on how much commission he received). He subsequently took a long leave between June and December 2002. In his confession, he stated he was on "medication for acne that required 4 months leave".
youth with a samurai sword. In addition to his own financial troubles, Nguyen said he tried to help pay his twin brother's debt of A$12,000. His twin brother's loan had to be repaid by the end of the 2002. Nguyen could afford to repay only A$4000, the interest on the loan.
By October 2002, Nguyen had been out of a job for four months and sustaining expenses which included interest on the loan and personal living costs, all totaling A$580 a month. In November 2002, Nguyen contacted a Chinese man named "Tan", who told him to travel to Sydney to meet a Vietnamese man named "Sun". Sun proposed that he would repay Nguyen's loans if Nguyen transported packages from Cambodia back to Melbourne and possibly Sydney, via Singapore. The man said the packages contained "white", which Nguyen understood to be heroin.
It was Nguyen's first trip overseas from Australia since his immigration. He reached Phnom Penh
at midday on 3 December 2002 after leaving Sydney in the evening of the previous day. He met with a Cambodian man at the Lucky Burger restaurant on 4 December and was taken by car to a garage where he was told to smoke some heroin. The following day, Nguyen met his associates at the Lucky Burger and was again taken to the garage. Nguyen was instructed to stay in Phnom Penh until 10 December, at which point he was to meet at the Lucky Burger.
On 8 December, he decided to fly to Ho Chi Minh City
, Vietnam, missed the scheduled meeting on 10 December after arriving back late from Ho Chi Minh City. On 11 December he was taken to the garage, where he was then instructed on how to crush heroin bricks and to strap the powdered drug packages to his body. The rest of the day was spent crushing and packaging the drugs in his hotel room. He checked out of the hotel the next day and went to the airport.
, he triggered a metal detector
. A package of heroin from Cambodia was found strapped to his body. After the first package was discovered, Nguyen informed the airport official about a second package in his luggage.
Nguyen confessed to have in his possession 396.2 g of heroin, more than 26 times the amount of heroin that mandates a death sentence under the Misuse of Drugs Act
(Illegal traffic, import or export of Heroin of more than 15 grams). The Singaporean High Court
sentenced Nguyen to death for this crime on 20 March 2004. After he was convicted, Nguyen was held on death row
in Changi Prison
.
An appeal to the Court of Appeal
was rejected on 20 October 2004. Nguyen's family received a registered letter from the Singapore Prisons Department, notifying of his scheduled hanging
on 2 December 2005. On the same day at the APEC
Summit in South Korea, Australian Prime Minister John Howard
made a last appeal on Nguyen's behalf to the Singaporean Prime Minister, Lee Hsien Loong
. However, the letter of notice by that time had already been delivered to Nguyen's mother.
Howard later said he was "very disappointed" that Lee did not inform him of Nguyen's execution date during their meeting that morning. Singapore Foreign Affairs Minister George Yeo
also conveyed his apologies to his counterpart Alexander Downer
. Nguyen's lawyers arrived in Singapore on 18 November 2005 to inform their client of his impending execution date.
A survey by Morgan Poll released on 30 November 2005 showed 47% of Australians believed Nguyen should be executed, 46% said the death penalty should not be carried out, and 7% were undecided.
On 2 December 2005 Nguyen was executed at 6:07 am SGT and was officially reported as dead at 7:17 am SGT by the Ministry of Home Affairs. In a short statement, the Ministry said, "The sentence was carried out this morning at Changi Prison."
On 21 November 2005, the Australian Government was considering a request made by Nguyen Tuong Van's lawyers to apply for a hearing at the International Court of Justice
which required the Singaporean government's agreement to its jurisdiction. However, Foreign Minister Downer considered it unlikely that the Singaporean government would agree. On 24 November 2005, Victorian Attorney General Rob Hulls met with Singapore's Senior Minister of State for Law and Home Affairs Ho Peng Kee to press the case for clemency but was unsuccessful. On 28 November 2005 Australia's Human Rights
Commissioner, Sev Ozdowski, said Australia must keep pressuring Singapore to abandon the death penalty, even if it proves too late for Nguyen.
After his sentencing in March 2004, the Australian Coalition Against Death Penalty (ACADP) was reported to be inundated with emails from Australians offering support for Van Tuong Nguyen.
Politicians and religious figures made pleas for clemency, but these were rejected by the Singaporean government.
One day before Nguyen was hanged, a lawyer launched a last-ditch legal tactic, charging Nguyen with drug related offences in the Melbourne Magistrates' Court
, which he hoped would allow the Australian Federal Government to extradite Nguyen. However, Justice Minister Chris Ellison
ruled out extradition, saying that the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions would not have attempted to prosecute Nguyen in Australia.
was criticized by Howard Glenn and Greg Barns
for refusing to work with other human rights groups with various campaigns to save Nguyen, but rather asking the public to donate money to Amnesty International.
program Sunrise
had reporter Chris Reason
reporting from outside the jail, and Melbourne reporter Nick Etchells
reporting from a church in Richmond
at the time Nguyen was due to be hanged. Channel Seven also had Adrian Brown
report minute by minute, and, at around 6:10 am SGT, he reported: "Well, it's just about 6:10 now, so it's fair to assume that Van Nguyen is now dead" and had been covering all the news throughout the previous fortnight.
ABC
broadcast a documentary: Just Punishment on 7 December 2006. This documentary was filmed over a period of two years. Following Nguyen's mother(Kim), his brother and his two close friends, through the appeals, and campaigns held (in Australia) before the execution day. It was rebroadcast on the night of 8 December 2008, also on the ABC
.
An opinion poll
conducted by Roy Morgan Research
two days after Nguyen's execution showed 52% of Australians approved of it, compared with 44% against.
heroin. In a letter to David Hawker
, the Speaker of the Australian House of Representatives, Abdullah Tarmugi
, the Speaker of the Parliament of Singapore, wrote: "He was caught in possession of almost 400 grams of pure heroin, enough for more than 26,000 doses of heroin for drug addicts.... He knew what he was doing and the consequences of his actions. As representatives of the people, we have an obligation to protect the lives of those who could be ruined by the drugs he was carrying."
"We cannot allow Singapore to be used as a transit for illicit drugs in the region," Tarmugi wrote to Australian MPs. "We know this is a painful and difficult decision for Mr Nguyen's family to accept, but we hope you and your colleagues will understand our position."
In an opinion piece in the Sydney Morning Herald, Singapore's High Commissioner
in Australia, Joseph Koh, argued that "Singapore cannot afford to pull back from its tough drug trafficking position".
, leader of the Singapore Democratic Party
, who is an opponent of the mandatory death penalty.
A request was made by Liberal
MP
Bruce Baird
for an official minute's silence to honour Nguyen. Representatives of the Returned and Services League
objected, stating such tributes should be reserved for fallen soldiers or victims of natural disasters; other groups felt it was inappropriate to "honour" a convicted trafficker of drugs which killed hundreds each year. A motion to hold a minute's silence passed in the Queensland Legislative Assembly
49-18 after an hour's debate. MPs who voted against the move walked out before the observance.
After the execution, Nguyen's body was released to his family and it left Changi Prison about four hours after he was hanged. Nguyen's body was taken to the Marymount Chapel of the Good Shepherd's Convent in Singapore for a private memorial service at 1 pm. The family requested for the media to stay away from the chapel. His family returned to Melbourne with his body on 4 December 2005. A requiem mass
was held at St. Patrick's Cathedral
on 7 December 2005. Victorian MPs Geoff Hilton
, Bruce Mildenhall
, Sang Minh Nguyen and Richard Wynne
attended the service and were criticised by the Crime Victims Support Association, who said it appeared to give support to a convicted drug trafficker. Premier of Victoria, Steve Bracks
did not oppose the other MPs attending.
used the execution of Nguyen as a warning to young people to stay away from drugs. He told Melbourne radio station 3AW
:
Federal Health Minister Tony Abbott
also said that the Singapore government's decision to go ahead with the execution was wrong and that the punishment "certainly did not fit the crime.... But people do need to understand that drug trafficking is a very serious offence and it has heavy penalties in Australia and it has even more drastic penalties overseas as we have been reminded today."
luggage), John Howard, the Australian Prime Minister, said that the country would not be taking any punitive action against Singapore.
On 23 February 2006, the Australian government rejected a bid by Singapore Airlines for permission to fly a permanent route between Sydney and the United States. This drew strong criticism from the government of Singapore. Peter Costello
, the Australian treasurer
, denied that the refusal was linked to Nguyen's hanging.
Saint's name
A saint’s name is the name of a saint given to individuals at their baptism within the Catholic Church. The custom of giving the name of a saint originated in France and Germany during the Middle Ages...
Caleb, was an Australian from Melbourne, Victoria convicted of drug trafficking in Singapore
Singapore
Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...
. A Vietnamese Australian
Vietnamese Australian
A Vietnamese Australian is an Australian either born in Vietnam or is an Australian descendant of the former. Communities of Overseas Vietnamese are referred to as Việt Kiều or người Việt hải ngoại.-History in Australia:...
, he was also addressed as Nguyen Tuong Van in the Singaporean media, his name in Vietnamese custom
Vietnamese name
Vietnamese names generally consist of three parts: a family name, a middle name, and a given name, used in that order. The "family name first" order follows the system of Chinese names and is common throughout the Sinosphere , but is different from Chinese, Korean, and Japanese names in having a...
.
Drug trafficking
Capital punishment for drug trafficking
In certain countries importing, exporting or even possession of illegal drugs is punishable by death.-Issues:There have been issues about having the death penalty for drug trafficking, including being framed with someone else putting drugs into another's luggage at airports...
carries a mandatory death sentence
Capital punishment in Singapore
Capital punishment is a legal form of punishment in Singapore. The city-state had the highest per-capita execution rate in the world between 1994 and 1999, estimated by the United Nations to be 1.357 executions per hundred thousand of population during that period. The next highest was Turkmenistan...
under Singapore's Misuse of Drugs Act
Misuse of Drugs Act (Singapore)
The Misuse of Drugs Act is a national drug control law classifying substances into three categories, Classes A, B, and C. Section 44 provides that "The Minister may, by an order published in the Gazette" add, remove, or transfer drugs among the classes...
, and despite pleas for clemency
Pardon
Clemency means the forgiveness of a crime or the cancellation of the penalty associated with it. It is a general concept that encompasses several related procedures: pardoning, commutation, remission and reprieves...
from the Australian government
Government of Australia
The Commonwealth of Australia is a federal constitutional monarchy under a parliamentary democracy. The Commonwealth of Australia was formed in 1901 as a result of an agreement among six self-governing British colonies, which became the six states...
, Amnesty International
Amnesty International
Amnesty International is an international non-governmental organisation whose stated mission is "to conduct research and generate action to prevent and end grave abuses of human rights, and to demand justice for those whose rights have been violated."Following a publication of Peter Benenson's...
, the Holy See
Holy See
The Holy See is the episcopal jurisdiction of the Catholic Church in Rome, in which its Bishop is commonly known as the Pope. It is the preeminent episcopal see of the Catholic Church, forming the central government of the Church. As such, diplomatically, and in other spheres the Holy See acts and...
, as well as other individuals and groups, he was executed by hanging
Hanging
Hanging is the lethal suspension of a person by a ligature. The Oxford English Dictionary states that hanging in this sense is "specifically to put to death by suspension by the neck", though it formerly also referred to crucifixion and death by impalement in which the body would remain...
at 6:07 am SST
Singapore Standard Time
Singapore Standard Time or Singapore Time based in Singapore uses a time zone eight hours in advance of UTC .- History :...
on 2 December 2005 at Changi Prison
Changi Prison
Changi Prison is a prison located in Changi in the eastern part of Singapore.-First prison and POW camp:...
(22:07 UTC
Coordinated Universal Time
Coordinated Universal Time is the primary time standard by which the world regulates clocks and time. It is one of several closely related successors to Greenwich Mean Time. Computer servers, online services and other entities that rely on having a universally accepted time use UTC for that purpose...
, 1 December).
Biography
Nguyen and his twin brother, Dang Khoa Nguyen, were born in a refugee campRefugee camp
A refugee camp is a temporary settlement built to receive refugees. Hundreds of thousands of people may live in any one single camp. Usually they are built and run by a government, the United Nations, or international organizations, or NGOs.Refugee camps are generally set up in an impromptu...
at Songkhla
Songkhla
Songkhla is a city in the Songkhla Province of southern Thailand, near the border with Malaysia. As of 2006 it had a population of 75,048...
in Thailand
Thailand
Thailand , officially the Kingdom of Thailand , formerly known as Siam , is a country located at the centre of the Indochina peninsula and Southeast Asia. It is bordered to the north by Burma and Laos, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the...
to Vietnamese
Vietnamese people
The Vietnamese people are an ethnic group originating from present-day northern Vietnam and southern China. They are the majority ethnic group of Vietnam, comprising 86% of the population as of the 1999 census, and are officially known as Kinh to distinguish them from other ethnic groups in Vietnam...
parents. He did not know his father until 2001 when he travelled from the United States to Australia. His mother, Kim, is Vietnamese
Vietnamese people
The Vietnamese people are an ethnic group originating from present-day northern Vietnam and southern China. They are the majority ethnic group of Vietnam, comprising 86% of the population as of the 1999 census, and are officially known as Kinh to distinguish them from other ethnic groups in Vietnam...
and migrated, like boat people
Boat people
Boat people is a term that usually refers to refugees, illegal immigrants or asylum seekers who emigrate in numbers in boats that are sometimes old and crudely made...
, to Australia shortly after the boys' birth. She married a Vietnamese Australian in 1987, who beat them often, according to Nguyen. His education was at St Joseph's Primary School in Springvale
Springvale, Victoria
Springvale is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, approximately 20 km south-east from Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government Area is the City of Greater Dandenong...
and Mount Waverley Secondary College
Mount Waverley Secondary College
Mount Waverley Secondary College is a Public secondary school located in the Melbourne suburb of Mount Waverley. The school consists of roughly 1900 students and is one of the largest in the state....
.
After leaving school at 18, he intended to study at Deakin University
Deakin University
Deakin University is an Australian public university with nearly 40,000 higher education students in 2010. It receives more than A$600 million in operating revenue annually, and controls more than A$1.3 billion in assets. It received more than A$35 million in research income in 2009 and had 835...
, but financial difficulties led him to work as a store clerk, door-to-door salesman, computer sales and research marketing. He started his own computer sales business in 1999. After his brother Khoa got into legal trouble, Nguyen wound up the business. He then found a sales, research and marketing job and earned between A$
Australian dollar
The Australian dollar is the currency of the Commonwealth of Australia, including Christmas Island, Cocos Islands, and Norfolk Island, as well as the independent Pacific Island states of Kiribati, Nauru and Tuvalu...
1500 to A$2500 a month (depending on how much commission he received). He subsequently took a long leave between June and December 2002. In his confession, he stated he was on "medication for acne that required 4 months leave".
Drug trafficking
Throughout his trial, Nguyen claimed that he was carrying the drugs in a bid to pay off debts amounting to approximately A$20,000 to A$25,000 that he owed and to repay legal fees his twin brother Khoa (a former heroin addict) had incurred in defending drug-trafficking and other criminal charges including an attack on a Pacific IslanderPacific Islander
Pacific Islander , is a geographic term to describe the indigenous inhabitants of any of the three major sub-regions of Oceania: Polynesia, Melanesia and Micronesia.According to the Encyclopædia Britannica, these three regions, together with their islands consist of:Polynesia:...
youth with a samurai sword. In addition to his own financial troubles, Nguyen said he tried to help pay his twin brother's debt of A$12,000. His twin brother's loan had to be repaid by the end of the 2002. Nguyen could afford to repay only A$4000, the interest on the loan.
By October 2002, Nguyen had been out of a job for four months and sustaining expenses which included interest on the loan and personal living costs, all totaling A$580 a month. In November 2002, Nguyen contacted a Chinese man named "Tan", who told him to travel to Sydney to meet a Vietnamese man named "Sun". Sun proposed that he would repay Nguyen's loans if Nguyen transported packages from Cambodia back to Melbourne and possibly Sydney, via Singapore. The man said the packages contained "white", which Nguyen understood to be heroin.
It was Nguyen's first trip overseas from Australia since his immigration. He reached Phnom Penh
Phnom Penh
Phnom Penh is the capital and largest city of Cambodia. Located on the banks of the Mekong River, Phnom Penh has been the national capital since the French colonized Cambodia, and has grown to become the nation's center of economic and industrial activities, as well as the center of security,...
at midday on 3 December 2002 after leaving Sydney in the evening of the previous day. He met with a Cambodian man at the Lucky Burger restaurant on 4 December and was taken by car to a garage where he was told to smoke some heroin. The following day, Nguyen met his associates at the Lucky Burger and was again taken to the garage. Nguyen was instructed to stay in Phnom Penh until 10 December, at which point he was to meet at the Lucky Burger.
On 8 December, he decided to fly to Ho Chi Minh City
Ho Chi Minh City
Ho Chi Minh City , formerly named Saigon is the largest city in Vietnam...
, Vietnam, missed the scheduled meeting on 10 December after arriving back late from Ho Chi Minh City. On 11 December he was taken to the garage, where he was then instructed on how to crush heroin bricks and to strap the powdered drug packages to his body. The rest of the day was spent crushing and packaging the drugs in his hotel room. He checked out of the hotel the next day and went to the airport.
Arrest and conviction
On boarding his flight to Melbourne after a four hour stopover at Singapore Changi AirportSingapore Changi Airport
Singapore Changi Airport , Changi International Airport, or simply Changi Airport, is the main airport in Singapore. A major aviation hub in Southeast Asia, it is about north-east from the commercial centre in Changi, on a site....
, he triggered a metal detector
Metal detector
A metal detector is a device which responds to metal that may not be readily apparent.The simplest form of a metal detector consists of an oscillator producing an alternating current that passes through a coil producing an alternating magnetic field...
. A package of heroin from Cambodia was found strapped to his body. After the first package was discovered, Nguyen informed the airport official about a second package in his luggage.
Nguyen confessed to have in his possession 396.2 g of heroin, more than 26 times the amount of heroin that mandates a death sentence under the Misuse of Drugs Act
Misuse of Drugs Act (Singapore)
The Misuse of Drugs Act is a national drug control law classifying substances into three categories, Classes A, B, and C. Section 44 provides that "The Minister may, by an order published in the Gazette" add, remove, or transfer drugs among the classes...
(Illegal traffic, import or export of Heroin of more than 15 grams). The Singaporean High Court
Judicial system of Singapore
The full Judicial power in Singapore is vested in the Supreme Court as well as subordinate courts by the Constitution of Singapore. The Supreme Court consists of the Court of Appeal and the High Court. The Court of Appeal exercises appellate criminal and civil jurisdiction, while the High Court...
sentenced Nguyen to death for this crime on 20 March 2004. After he was convicted, Nguyen was held on death row
Death row
Death row signifies the place, often a section of a prison, that houses individuals awaiting execution. The term is also used figuratively to describe the state of awaiting execution , even in places where no special facility or separate unit for condemned inmates exists.After individuals are found...
in Changi Prison
Changi Prison
Changi Prison is a prison located in Changi in the eastern part of Singapore.-First prison and POW camp:...
.
An appeal to the Court of Appeal
Court of Appeal of Singapore
The Court of Appeal of the Republic of Singapore is the nation's highest court and its court of final appeal. It is the upper division of the Supreme Court of Singapore, the lower being the High Court. The Court of Appeal consists of the Chief Justice of Singapore, who is the President of the...
was rejected on 20 October 2004. Nguyen's family received a registered letter from the Singapore Prisons Department, notifying of his scheduled hanging
Hanging
Hanging is the lethal suspension of a person by a ligature. The Oxford English Dictionary states that hanging in this sense is "specifically to put to death by suspension by the neck", though it formerly also referred to crucifixion and death by impalement in which the body would remain...
on 2 December 2005. On the same day at the APEC
Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation
Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation is a forum for 21 Pacific Rim countries that seeks to promote free trade and economic cooperation throughout the Asia-Pacific region...
Summit in South Korea, Australian Prime Minister John Howard
John Howard
John Winston Howard AC, SSI, was the 25th Prime Minister of Australia, from 11 March 1996 to 3 December 2007. He was the second-longest serving Australian Prime Minister after Sir Robert Menzies....
made a last appeal on Nguyen's behalf to the Singaporean Prime Minister, Lee Hsien Loong
Lee Hsien Loong
Lee Hsien Loong is the third and current Prime Minister of Singapore. He is married to Ho Ching, who is the Executive Director and Chief Executive Officer of Temasek Holdings. He is the eldest son of Singapore's first Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew....
. However, the letter of notice by that time had already been delivered to Nguyen's mother.
Howard later said he was "very disappointed" that Lee did not inform him of Nguyen's execution date during their meeting that morning. Singapore Foreign Affairs Minister George Yeo
George Yeo
George Yeo Yong-Boon is a former politician from Singapore. A member of the governing People's Action Party , he served in the Cabinet from 1991 to 2011 as the Minister for Information and the Arts , Minister for Health , Minister for Trade and Industry and Minister for Foreign Affairs...
also conveyed his apologies to his counterpart Alexander Downer
Alexander Downer
Alexander John Gosse Downer is a former Australian Liberal Party politician who was Foreign Minister of Australia from March 1996 to December 2007, the longest-serving in Australian history...
. Nguyen's lawyers arrived in Singapore on 18 November 2005 to inform their client of his impending execution date.
A survey by Morgan Poll released on 30 November 2005 showed 47% of Australians believed Nguyen should be executed, 46% said the death penalty should not be carried out, and 7% were undecided.
On 2 December 2005 Nguyen was executed at 6:07 am SGT and was officially reported as dead at 7:17 am SGT by the Ministry of Home Affairs. In a short statement, the Ministry said, "The sentence was carried out this morning at Changi Prison."
Pleas for clemency
A plea for clemency by the Australian Government was rejected in October 2005. Members of Federal and state parliaments appealed for the decision to be reconsidered and clemency to be granted. His hanging was the first execution of an Australian in Southeast Asia since 1993, when Michael McAuliffe was hanged in Malaysia for drug trafficking.On 21 November 2005, the Australian Government was considering a request made by Nguyen Tuong Van's lawyers to apply for a hearing at the International Court of Justice
International Court of Justice
The International Court of Justice is the primary judicial organ of the United Nations. It is based in the Peace Palace in The Hague, Netherlands...
which required the Singaporean government's agreement to its jurisdiction. However, Foreign Minister Downer considered it unlikely that the Singaporean government would agree. On 24 November 2005, Victorian Attorney General Rob Hulls met with Singapore's Senior Minister of State for Law and Home Affairs Ho Peng Kee to press the case for clemency but was unsuccessful. On 28 November 2005 Australia's Human Rights
Human rights
Human rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...
Commissioner, Sev Ozdowski, said Australia must keep pressuring Singapore to abandon the death penalty, even if it proves too late for Nguyen.
After his sentencing in March 2004, the Australian Coalition Against Death Penalty (ACADP) was reported to be inundated with emails from Australians offering support for Van Tuong Nguyen.
Politicians and religious figures made pleas for clemency, but these were rejected by the Singaporean government.
One day before Nguyen was hanged, a lawyer launched a last-ditch legal tactic, charging Nguyen with drug related offences in the Melbourne Magistrates' Court
Melbourne Magistrates' Court
The Melbourne Magistrates' Court is a venue of the Magistrates' Court of Victoria. It is a court in Melbourne, Australia that deals with a range of criminal offences, money claims and disputes up to $100,000 and family violence and family law proceedings...
, which he hoped would allow the Australian Federal Government to extradite Nguyen. However, Justice Minister Chris Ellison
Chris Ellison
Christopher Martin Ellison , is a former Liberal member of the Australian Senate. He represented Western Australia in the Senate from July 1993 to January 2009.-Background:...
ruled out extradition, saying that the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions would not have attempted to prosecute Nguyen in Australia.
Criticism
The Australian Government was criticised by the media, human rights lawyers and human rights activists for doing too little, too late and for not taking a stronger stance against the death penalty. Amnesty InternationalAmnesty International
Amnesty International is an international non-governmental organisation whose stated mission is "to conduct research and generate action to prevent and end grave abuses of human rights, and to demand justice for those whose rights have been violated."Following a publication of Peter Benenson's...
was criticized by Howard Glenn and Greg Barns
Greg Barns
Greg Barns is an Australian barrister, author, political commentator and former political candidate based in Hobart, Tasmania.-Political career:...
for refusing to work with other human rights groups with various campaigns to save Nguyen, but rather asking the public to donate money to Amnesty International.
Media coverage and public opinion
Channel SevenSeven Network
The Seven Network is an Australian television network owned by Seven West Media Limited. It dates back to 4 November 1956, when the first stations on the VHF7 frequency were established in Melbourne and Sydney.It is currently the second largest network in the country in terms of population reach...
program Sunrise
Sunrise (TV program)
Sunrise is an Australian breakfast television program, broadcast on the Seven Network. On weekdays the programme follows Seven Early News, and runs from 6am through to 9am.-History:...
had reporter Chris Reason
Chris Reason
Chris Reason is a senior reporter for Seven News in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.-Career:Chris began his career in newspapers - first The Redland Times then The Sun in Brisbane. He has also worked for Nine Network in the Gold Coast for a year.Reason came to Seven News in 1990 in Brisbane as a...
reporting from outside the jail, and Melbourne reporter Nick Etchells
Nick Etchells
Nick Etchells is an Australian journalist.Etchells is currently Melbourne Correspondent on Sunrise.Nick joined A Current Affair in December 2007 after an extensive career in news reporting....
reporting from a church in Richmond
Richmond, Victoria
Richmond is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 3 km south-east from Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government Area is the City of Yarra...
at the time Nguyen was due to be hanged. Channel Seven also had Adrian Brown
Adrian Brown (journalist)
Adrian Brown is a reporter for Seven News in Sydney.He recently returned to Sydney after almost 16 years running a reporting and camera company based in Hong Kong. During that time, he also filed stories for National Nine News...
report minute by minute, and, at around 6:10 am SGT, he reported: "Well, it's just about 6:10 now, so it's fair to assume that Van Nguyen is now dead" and had been covering all the news throughout the previous fortnight.
ABC
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation, commonly referred to as "the ABC" , is Australia's national public broadcaster...
broadcast a documentary: Just Punishment on 7 December 2006. This documentary was filmed over a period of two years. Following Nguyen's mother(Kim), his brother and his two close friends, through the appeals, and campaigns held (in Australia) before the execution day. It was rebroadcast on the night of 8 December 2008, also on the ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
.
An opinion poll
Opinion poll
An opinion poll, sometimes simply referred to as a poll is a survey of public opinion from a particular sample. Opinion polls are usually designed to represent the opinions of a population by conducting a series of questions and then extrapolating generalities in ratio or within confidence...
conducted by Roy Morgan Research
Roy Morgan Research
Roy Morgan Research is an Australian market research company headquartered in Melbourne, Victoria; it was founded in 1941 by Roy Morgan ; its Executive Chairman today is his son, Gary Morgan....
two days after Nguyen's execution showed 52% of Australians approved of it, compared with 44% against.
Singaporean response
As a transportation hub, Singapore has always been a potential transit point for Golden TriangleGolden Triangle (Southeast Asia)
The Golden Triangle is one of Asia's two main illicit opium-producing areas. It is an area of around that overlaps the mountains of four countries of Southeast Asia: Burma, Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand. Along with Afghanistan in the Golden Crescent and Pakistan, it has been one of the most...
heroin. In a letter to David Hawker
David Hawker
David Peter Maxwell Hawker , Australian politician, was a Liberal member of the Australian House of Representatives from May 1983 to July 2010, representing the Division of Wannon, Victoria, previously represented by former Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser. He was born in Adelaide, and was educated at...
, the Speaker of the Australian House of Representatives, Abdullah Tarmugi
Abdullah Tarmugi
Abdullah Tarmugi was the Speaker of the Parliament of Singapore as well as the Member of Parliament of East Coast Group Representation Constituency from 1996 to 2011.Born to a Javanese Father and Chinese Mother...
, the Speaker of the Parliament of Singapore, wrote: "He was caught in possession of almost 400 grams of pure heroin, enough for more than 26,000 doses of heroin for drug addicts.... He knew what he was doing and the consequences of his actions. As representatives of the people, we have an obligation to protect the lives of those who could be ruined by the drugs he was carrying."
"We cannot allow Singapore to be used as a transit for illicit drugs in the region," Tarmugi wrote to Australian MPs. "We know this is a painful and difficult decision for Mr Nguyen's family to accept, but we hope you and your colleagues will understand our position."
In an opinion piece in the Sydney Morning Herald, Singapore's High Commissioner
High Commissioner (Commonwealth)
In the Commonwealth of Nations, a High Commissioner is the senior diplomat in charge of the diplomatic mission of one Commonwealth government to another.-History:...
in Australia, Joseph Koh, argued that "Singapore cannot afford to pull back from its tough drug trafficking position".
Vigils
A group of human rights activists held a vigil for Nguyen in Singapore on 7 November 2005. Among those present was opposition politician Chee Soon JuanChee Soon Juan
Chee Soon Juan, PhD is a politician and political activist from Singapore. He is currently the leader of the opposition Singapore Democratic Party ....
, leader of the Singapore Democratic Party
Singapore Democratic Party
The Singapore Democratic Party is an opposition political party in Singapore.The party was founded in 1980 by Chiam See Tong, who as Secretary-General became the party's first Member of Parliament in 1984 when he was elected as MP for Potong Pasir...
, who is an opponent of the mandatory death penalty.
A request was made by Liberal
Liberal Party of Australia
The Liberal Party of Australia is an Australian political party.Founded a year after the 1943 federal election to replace the United Australia Party, the centre-right Liberal Party typically competes with the centre-left Australian Labor Party for political office...
MP
Australian House of Representatives
The House of Representatives is one of the two houses of the Parliament of Australia; it is the lower house; the upper house is the Senate. Members of Parliament serve for terms of approximately three years....
Bruce Baird
Bruce Baird
Bruce George Baird, AM , is a former Australian politician.-Early life:Baird was born in Sydney, and was educated at the University of Sydney and the University of Melbourne, holding a master's degree in business administration from the latter...
for an official minute's silence to honour Nguyen. Representatives of the Returned and Services League
Returned and Services League of Australia
The Returned and Services League of Australia is a support organisation for men and women who have served or are serving in the Australian Defence Force ....
objected, stating such tributes should be reserved for fallen soldiers or victims of natural disasters; other groups felt it was inappropriate to "honour" a convicted trafficker of drugs which killed hundreds each year. A motion to hold a minute's silence passed in the Queensland Legislative Assembly
Queensland Legislative Assembly
The Queensland Legislative Assembly is the unicameral chamber of the Parliament of Queensland. Elections are held approximately once every three years. Voting is by the Optional Preferential Voting form of the Alternative Vote system...
49-18 after an hour's debate. MPs who voted against the move walked out before the observance.
Execution and funeral
A minor controversy occurred when Singapore's contract hangman, Darshan Singh, gave an interview to an Australian newspaper prior to the execution in which he said he hoped to be called on to perform the execution and that his experience would ensure Nguyen would be hanged "efficiently". The result was disapprobation in both Australia and Singapore. Nguyen was hanged by another executioner.After the execution, Nguyen's body was released to his family and it left Changi Prison about four hours after he was hanged. Nguyen's body was taken to the Marymount Chapel of the Good Shepherd's Convent in Singapore for a private memorial service at 1 pm. The family requested for the media to stay away from the chapel. His family returned to Melbourne with his body on 4 December 2005. A requiem mass
Requiem
A Requiem or Requiem Mass, also known as Mass for the dead or Mass of the dead , is a Mass celebrated for the repose of the soul or souls of one or more deceased persons, using a particular form of the Roman Missal...
was held at St. Patrick's Cathedral
St Patrick's Cathedral, Melbourne
St Patrick's Cathedral is the cathedral church of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Melbourne in Victoria, Australia, and seat of its archbishop, currently Denis J. Hart. The building is known internationally as a leading example of the Gothic Revival style of architecture.In 1974 Pope Paul VI...
on 7 December 2005. Victorian MPs Geoff Hilton
Geoff Hilton
John Geoffrey Hilton is an Australian politician. He was an Australian Labor Party member of the Victorian Legislative Council from 2006 to 2006, representing Western Port Province....
, Bruce Mildenhall
Bruce Mildenhall
Bruce Allan Mildenhall was an Australian politician and a member of the Victorian Legislative Assembly for the division of Footscray....
, Sang Minh Nguyen and Richard Wynne
Richard Wynne
Hon. Richard William Wynne MLA is an Australian politician and former Minister for Housing, Minister for Local Government and Minister for Aboriginal Affairs in the State Cabinet of the Government of Victoria, and has held the Legislative Assembly seat of Richmond in the Victorian Parliament since...
attended the service and were criticised by the Crime Victims Support Association, who said it appeared to give support to a convicted drug trafficker. Premier of Victoria, Steve Bracks
Steve Bracks
Stephen Philip Bracks AC is a former Australian politician and the 44th Premier of Victoria. He first won the electoral district of Williamstown in 1994 for the Australian Labor Party, and was party leader and Premier from 1999 to 2007....
did not oppose the other MPs attending.
John Howard's warning against illicit drugs
Australian Prime Minister John HowardJohn Howard
John Winston Howard AC, SSI, was the 25th Prime Minister of Australia, from 11 March 1996 to 3 December 2007. He was the second-longest serving Australian Prime Minister after Sir Robert Menzies....
used the execution of Nguyen as a warning to young people to stay away from drugs. He told Melbourne radio station 3AW
3AW
3AW is a talkback radio station in Melbourne, Australia on 693 kHz AM. It began transmission on 22 February 1932 as Melbourne's fifth commercial radio station.-History:...
:
Federal Health Minister Tony Abbott
Tony Abbott
Anthony John "Tony" Abbott is the Leader of the Opposition in the Australian House of Representatives and federal leader of the centre-right Liberal Party of Australia. Abbott has represented the seat of Warringah since the 1994 by-election...
also said that the Singapore government's decision to go ahead with the execution was wrong and that the punishment "certainly did not fit the crime.... But people do need to understand that drug trafficking is a very serious offence and it has heavy penalties in Australia and it has even more drastic penalties overseas as we have been reminded today."
Australia–Singapore relations
While it was reported that some minor ties have been broken (including airport workers to process Singapore AirlinesSingapore Airlines
Singapore Airlines Limited is the flag carrier airline of Singapore. Singapore Airlines operates a hub at Changi Airport and has a strong presence in the Southeast Asia, East Asia, South Asia, and "Kangaroo Route" markets...
luggage), John Howard, the Australian Prime Minister, said that the country would not be taking any punitive action against Singapore.
On 23 February 2006, the Australian government rejected a bid by Singapore Airlines for permission to fly a permanent route between Sydney and the United States. This drew strong criticism from the government of Singapore. Peter Costello
Peter Costello
Peter Howard Costello AC is an Australian politician and lawyer who served as the Treasurer in the Australian government from 1996 to 2007. He is the longest-serving Treasurer in Australian history. Costello was a Member of the Australian House of Representatives from 1990 to 2009, representing...
, the Australian treasurer
Treasurer of Australia
The Treasurer of Australia is the minister in the Government of Australia responsible for government expenditure and revenue raising. He is the head of the Department of the Treasury. The Treasurer plays a key role in the economic policy of the government...
, denied that the refusal was linked to Nguyen's hanging.
See also
- Australian Van Nguyen executed in Singapore
- Bali NineBali NineThe Bali Nine is the name given to a group of nine Australians arrested on 17 April 2005, in Denpasar, Bali, Indonesia, in a plan to smuggle of heroin valued at approximately A$4 million from Indonesia to Australia...
- Capital punishment for drug traffickingCapital punishment for drug traffickingIn certain countries importing, exporting or even possession of illegal drugs is punishable by death.-Issues:There have been issues about having the death penalty for drug trafficking, including being framed with someone else putting drugs into another's luggage at airports...
- Barlow and Chambers executionBarlow and Chambers executionThe Barlow and Chambers execution refers to the hanging in 1986 by Malaysia of two Australian citizens, Kevin John Barlow and Brian Geoffrey Chambers of Perth, Western Australia, for the drug trafficking of 141.9 g of heroin....
- Capital punishment in SingaporeCapital punishment in SingaporeCapital punishment is a legal form of punishment in Singapore. The city-state had the highest per-capita execution rate in the world between 1994 and 1999, estimated by the United Nations to be 1.357 executions per hundred thousand of population during that period. The next highest was Turkmenistan...
- Schapelle CorbySchapelle CorbySchapelle Leigh Corby is an Australian woman convicted of drug smuggling who is imprisoned in Indonesia.Corby is serving a 20-year sentence for the importation of of cannabis into Bali, Indonesia...
- Michael P. FayMichael P. FayMichael Peter Fay is an American who briefly shot to international notoriety when he was sentenced to caning in Singapore as an 18-year-old in 1994 for theft and vandalism...
- Flor ContemplacionFlor ContemplacionFlor R. Contemplacion born in San Pablo City, Laguna, Philippines was a Filipina domestic worker who was executed in Singapore for murder...
- Illegal drug tradeIllegal drug tradeThe illegal drug trade is a global black market, dedicated to cultivation, manufacture, distribution and sale of those substances which are subject to drug prohibition laws. Most jurisdictions prohibit trade, except under license, of many types of drugs by drug prohibition laws.A UN report said the...
- Michelle LeslieMichelle LeslieMichelle Leslie , who also works under the name Michelle Lee, is an Australian model. Leslie is best known for her 2005 arrest, conviction and three-month imprisonment for possessing two ecstasy tablets in Bali, Indonesia...
- List of Australians in international prisons
- Prohibition (drugs)Prohibition (drugs)The prohibition of drugs through sumptuary legislation or religious law is a common means of attempting to prevent drug use. Prohibition of drugs has existed at various levels of government or other authority from the Middle Ages to the present....
- Iwuchukwu Amara TochiIwuchukwu Amara TochiIwuchukwu Amara Tochi was a Nigerian national convicted of drug trafficking in Singapore. Drug trafficking carries a mandatory death sentence under Singapore's Misuse of Drugs Act, and despite pleas for clemency from Amnesty International, the United Nations, President of Nigeria Olusẹgun Ọbasanjọ...