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Rabat – The penal court in Nador in northern Morocco has sentenced a man to death, the Moroccan daily Al Massae reported on Wednesday. The sentence comes at a time where Morocco where human rights NGOs still urge for the suspension of the death penalty in Morocco.
The person in question was found guilty of murdering a couple in the neighboring rural municipality of Bni Sidel Louta in February 2016.
The man committed his crime when broke into the couple’s house for robbery, according to Al Massae. When discovered by the family, he murdered the husband and his wife and severely injured their daughter and the father’s sister.
After a one-year deliberation, the court found the accused guilty of voluntary homicide, robbery with violence, taking victims as hostages, and committing torture and death threats against them.
In Morocco, the death penalty is still issued by courts but is rarely carried out. The last execution in the country happened in 1993 after the country’s biggest sexual violence case, when Mustapha Tabit, a police officer was found to have abused and video-taped hundreds of victims, was killed by firing squad.
The Moroccan Coalition Against the Death Penalty (CMCPM), which is made up of several human rights group, said in December 2016 that 93 prisoners in Morocco are currently on death row.
The coalition advocates for the “right to life” and urges Morocco to abolish the death penalty.
Advocates of eliminating capital punishment from local penal laws had on several occasions staged demonstrations and held conferences to push for a change in Moroccan legislation.
Anti-death penalty activists say that sentencing people to capital punishment is a “vengeful” attitude from the state and that the latter has no right to take people’s lives.
However, advocates for death penalty in Morocco see it as a “fair” sentence especially against criminals found guilty of multiple cases of muder.
