By: Katherine Hewitt Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia
PHNOM PENH, Cambodia – In November of 2017, the Supreme Court of Cambodia dissolved the Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP), the main opposition party to Prime Minister’s Hun Sen’s Cambodian People’s Party (CPP). Now, the former leader of the CNRP is asking people to boycott the upcoming elections in protest of the party’s ban. The current leader of the CNRP, Kem Sokha, was arrested in late 2017 on charges of treason.
Former CNRP leader, Sam Rainsy (front left) with Kem Sokha, the current leader who is in jail facing charges of treason. Photo courtesy of Tang Chhin Sothy.
Following the ban on the CNRP several countries have cut aid, imposed travel bans, and condemn the actions. Many nations like Japan are demanding free and fair elections in Cambodia. The CPP is predicted to win the next election almost completely unopposed.
Sam Rainsy, the former CNRP leader, recently tweeted, “I call on all my Cambodian fellow compatriots who believe in democracy to boycott the July 29, 2018 elections if the CNRP is not allowed to participate.” Rainsy has been extremely critical of the current Prime Minister, Hun Sen, for several years now; it is not clear whether his tweet reflects his personal beliefs or those of CNRP.
A spokesperson of the CPP said of Rainsy’s tweet, “The CNRP is already dead by the Supreme Court’s decision. Even if Sam Rainsy appeals until he dies, people no longer believe him.”
Many of the former members of the CNRP and its factions have found exile in the United States. It is here that they continue to mobilize and speak on Cambodian politics. One professor of diplomacy says, “Is the spirit of the CNRP still alive? Of course it’s still alive.” It is just continuing its work elsewhere until its reconstituted.
By: Karina Johnson
Impunity Watch Reporter, North America
WASHINGTON D.C. — On Monday, April 2, the Supreme Court of the United States issued a 7-2 decision to grant qualified immunity from prosecution to a police officer, Andrew Kisela, who shot a woman, Amy Hughes, for holding a kitchen knife outside her home.
Officers are entitled to qualified immunity as long as their conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known. Photo Courtesy of J. Scott Applewhite, Associated Press.
In May 2010, Kisela and his partner responded to a 911 call reporting a woman acting erratically and hacking a tree with a kitchen knife. They were joined by another police officer and saw Hughes—carrying a large kitchen knife—and her roommate, Sharon Chadwick, exiting their house. The three officers drew their weapons and ordered Hughes to drop the knife. When Hughes did not acknowledge the officers’ presence, Kisela shot Hughes four times. The entire encounter occurred in less than a minute.
While the three officers later testified that they believed Hughes to be a threat to her roommate, Chadwick said that Hughes was speaking to her calmly from six feet away and that Chadwick at no time felt threatened by Hughes. Kisela was the only officer to shoot at Hughes, and he did so without warning.
Hughes sued Kisela in a §1983 claim for $150,000 in damages, alleging that his use of deadly force was a violation of her Fourth Amendment rights. Initially, a federal judge had granted summary judgment in favor of Kisela, but that ruling was reversed by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
The Supreme Court’s per curiam decision overturned the Ninth Circuit’s ruling in favor of Hughes without full briefings or oral arguments. Justice Sotomayor wrote a dissenting opinion and was joined by Justice Ginsberg.
Qualified immunity protects ‘all but the plainly incompetent or those who knowingly violate the law.’ To challenge qualified immunity, courts must determine through precedent (1) if the official’s conduct counts as a violation of the plaintiff’s rights; and (2) if the plaintiff’s rights were clearly established. The Supreme Court determined that Kisela’s conduct, by shooting Hughes four times as she stood still in front of her house, did not violate any of Hughes’ established rights.
In her dissent, Justice Sotomayor wrote that the Supreme Court’s “one-sided approach to qualified immunity transforms the doctrine into an absolute shield for law enforcement officers, gutting the deterrent effect of the Fourth Amendment,” and that “it tells officers that they can shoot first and think later, and it tells the public that palpably unreasonable conduct will go unpunished.”
The Washington Post noted that the Supreme Court has developed a trend of siding in favor of law enforcement officers by reversing lower courts that deny qualified immunity to police. Police officials applaud the Supreme Court’s broad approach, which they say give officers the benefit of the doubt and protect them from “frivolous lawsuits.” Critics such as the libertarian-leaning Cato Institute believe this approach virtually absolves law enforcement from accountability for their misconduct.
The majority’s decision comes 15 days after police officers killed Stephon Clark while he was standing in his grandmother’s backyard in Sacramento, California. It comes 3 days after the Louisiana Attorney General declined to file charges against the two Baton Rouge police officers that shot Alton Sterling at point-blank range outside of a convenience store while they had him pinned to the ground. As of April 1, there have been 325 reports of people killed by police in the United States since January 1, 2018.
By: Sarah Purtill Impunity Watch Reporter, North America
NEW YORK, USA – Natasha Alexenko was 20 years old on August 6, 1993 when a man held a gun to her back. She had been trying to get her keys out when she felt the gun against her back. She heard that man say “If you don’t do everything I say I’ll blow your brains out.” The man brought Alexenko into the stairwell of her building where he sexually assaulted her at gun point. Alexenko went to the hospital that night for a rape kit. But it was not until 10 years later that she finally got the call from the New York County’s District Attorney’s office informing her that the rap kit had finally been tested.
“I was like, ‘This is great, it’s moving forward — I can’t believe it after all these years,’” says Alexenko. “It wasn’t until later that I thought, ‘Holy mackerel! Why on Earth did this take so long?’” Alexenko was unsure why it took so long to be tested. “It just doesn’t make sense,” Alexenko said. “Why would you put someone through this very invasive, whole-body exam, which is traumatizing in itself, take their rape kit and just let it sit there?”
Natasha Alexenko founded Natasha’s Justice Program to help fight againSt the backlog of rape kits across the United States. Photo Courtesy of Len Marks.
After her rape, Alexenko moved back home to Ontario. In Canada she had the support of her mother and close friends. But she ended up drinking heavily to try to get through the pain. “I just felt so much grief,” says Alexenko. She felt this way because she was not able to explain her assailants face to the police. “I blamed myself for not being able to help catch this man who was still out there, probably hurting other people.”
Four years after she received the call from the DA’s office, Alexenko’s assailant was caught. Victor Rondon was arrested in Las Vegas for jaywalking and then extradited to New York after he was finger printed by police. A year later, he was found guilty of eight counts of violent assault. He was also found guilty of burglary, robbery, two counts of rape, sodomy and sexual abuse. He was sentenced to 44 to 107 years in prison.
“I was just grateful that he was put behind bars,” said Alexenko, who fainted when she saw him at his trial. “My body just shut down. It wasn’t just that I was remembering stuff; it was like I was there.” In 2011, Alexenko founded Natasha’s Justice Program. The goal of the nonprofit is to get rid of the backlog of rape kits in the United States.
Alexenko’s story is not unique. In fact, her rape kit had been one of 17,000 unprocessed rape kits held in a storage facility in New York. Fortunately, New York City has since eliminated that backlog. Around the United States, there were 70,000 unprocessed rape kits in 2015. There are estimates that put that number in the hundreds of thousands.
According to Alexenko, people have started taking sexual assault and the backlog of rape kits much more seriously. The US Department of Justice announced it would be dedicating $41 million in federal grant money to test the 70,000 known unprocessed rape kits nationwide in 2015. So far, many communities have taken advantage of it.
“There’s been such a shift — and I think it’s because there have been so many survivors who have come forward,” says Alexenko. “There are so many amazing people who are fighting so hard.”
By: Katherine Hewitt Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia
YANGON, Myanmar – Court hearings have been taking place since January for two Reuters journalists that were arrested on December 12, 2017. Myanmar officials arrested Wa Lone and Kyaw She Oo for obtaining state secrets from two police officers working in the Rakhine state. The journalists had been working on a story in relation to the mass killings of Rohingya in the Rakhine state.
Wa Lone pictured after April 4, 2018’s case hearing. Photo Courtesy of Reuter/ Ann Wang.
So far, 17 witnesses gave testimony in court in 13 hearings that have taken place. Lone’s and Oo’s lawyers say that the witnesses called forth by the prosecution are weak. There are inconsistencies in the testimonies. Additionally, several procedural mistakes were revealed during the court sessions. Testimonies included a witness who burned notes from the time of the arrest, another who wrote the information down on his hand, and one who signed the search form before the section detailing the items seized had been filled in. The defense attorney has called for the dismissal of the case based on this. The judge will decide at the next hearing on 11 April.
The prosecution team responded to the request to dismiss the case by stating that the information that the two journalist had was secret and that the journalist intended to hurt the country with that information. The defense team presented that that the prosecution could not establish that the information that the journalist obtained was secret as it had been published by both state and private media outlets.
Wa Lone told journalist after the court hearing, “We only did our work as reporters. I want the people to understand that and want to tell them that I never betrayed the country.” She Oo said, “We followed the news and uncovered the Inn Din story. The reason why we did it is to give the vitally important information to the country.”
PARIS, France – Lawmakers in France are in the process of formalizing the age of sexual consent after public outcry over two cases involving preteens.
Demonstrators Gather to Protect Sexual Abuse and Harassment in France. Photo Courtesy of Claude Paris.
France’s government has proposed new laws, one of which makes the age of sexual consent fifteen years. The legislation will be one of several measures taken by the government to combat sexual harassment and violence in the country.
The current law in France criminalizes sex with children under fifteen. However, prosecutors in those cases must prove that the sex was by force.
New measures also include increased prison sentences for perpetrators. There will be on-the-spot street fines issued for sexual harassment. Repeat offenders will face increasing fines.
The bill will also present sanctions for online harassment.
Additionally, underage rape victims will be able to report sexual violence until they are 48 years old, ten years longer than the current limit.
Prison sentences for rape involving penetration will increase from the current sentence of five years to ten years.
The push for new laws has gained momentum recently in France due to two high-profile cases involving eleven-year-old girls. The perpetrators in those cases, who were 28 and 30, were acquitted, causing an uproar in France and prompted the government to discuss tightening laws aimed toward combating sexual violence.
Marlene Schiappa, French Equality Minister, said that “we want to fix an age in the law below which it’s always forbidden to have sex with children, with young girls. Below which it’s always considered as a rape.”
President Macron supports the bills and hopes that the new laws ensure that “women are not afraid to be outside.”
In polls conducted in the country, ninety-two percent surveyed support extension of the statute of limitations, ninety percent support on-the-spot street fines and sixty-nine percent support setting the age of consent at fifteen years of age.
It is crucial that the laws of the republic make it clear that it is not allowed to harass or intimidate women…whether in the public space, on public transport or online” Schiappa said. “There can be no lawless zones.”
Age of consent laws vary internationally. Neighboring European countries such as the United Kingdom, Spain and Russia set the age of consent at 16, whereas in Germany, Italy and Hungary it is 14.
