The Death Penalty and Human Rights

There has been very little public intellectual discourse in the Commonwealth Caribbean on one of the most vexing issues of the criminal justice system: the retention of the death penalty as a punishment. In The Death Penalty and Human Rights, Sir Fred Phillips examines the changing nature of Caribbean jurisprudence away from the acceptance of the death penalty as a mandatory punishment in contrast to the prevailing dictates of political will which advocates for its retention.

On the international landscape, it is generally accepted that the death penalty runs contrary to the right to life and the right to humane treatment enshrined in several treaties and Conventions to which the countries of the Commonwealth Caribbean are signatures. Using the celebrated Jamaican case of Pratt and Morgan, the book examines and discusses the cases of the past two decades which have led to the changing jurisprudence on this life and death issue.

Unapologetic in the arguments for abolition of the death penalty, The Death Penalty and Human Rights is a concise examination of a sensitive yet important aspect of Caribbean jurisprudence.

Sir Fred Phillips is a Barrister-at-law and Queen's Counsel. A former Cabinet Secretary of the West Indies Federation and former Governor of the Associated State of St Kitts/Nevis/Anguilla, he has written five books on Constitutional Law and Legal Ethics. He lives in Antigua where he continues to write.

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