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Court urged to award death term to Arnold

DUBAI — The Court of Appeals was on Sunday presented with a memo asking for capital punishment to be awarded to Mark Arnold, a Briton accused of the premeditated murder of his South African ex-girlfriend Kerry Winter and dumping her body in the sea.

The memo was submitted by Counsel Hussein Al Jaziri on behalf of Winter’s family, which asked for the punishment as per the Shariah Rulings.

Al Jaziri was also allowed by the Court to be a party in the case as a blood guardian. He was earlier denied legal representation as a lawyer of civil damages. He asked a temporary panel of the Court that the proper legal articles of the Federal Penal Code be applied. He also stressed that the victim’s family members had the right and obligation to attend the hearings to take their opinions on the proper punishment, or pardon and call for blood money.

“The punishment for murder is death penalty as per Islamic Shariah unless the victim’s heirs decide otherwise on a pardon and accept blood money. Inflicting the capital punishment would be secured by the victim’s family insistence until execution. This would come true when they intervene and attend the prosecution hearings and even the execution,” Al Jaziri told the court. He said that no one but the victim’s family has the right to reduce the death penalty against someone convicted of murder.

He handed the court with legal documents and the court adjourned the case to August 8. The Court of First Instance sentenced 43-year-old Mark Arnold to 15-year imprisonment on June 7 for the premeditated murder of Winter. The court, presided over by Judge Hamad Abdel Latif Abdel Jawad, also ordered that Arnold be deported after serving his term. The panel of judges, including Mohammed Bilabed and Jassem Ibrahim, unanimously found Arnold guilty of the crime . It was known that the court bench granted the defendant leniency considering his conditions and the circumstances of the case.The civil case was referred to the civil competent court.

Winter went missing since August 20, 2008. The Public Prosecution says in its arraignment sheet that Arnold admitted during interrogation to beating Winter, whom he knew for five years, with a baseball bat on her head in her villa in Barsha. After he found that she was dead he disposed the body in the sea off Mina Al Siyahi using his yacht, blanket and weights.

Al Jaziri earlier presented in the court a list of claims and arguments stating in details how the defendant arranged in advance for the murder by buying a blanket and weights to dump the body and had earlier booked a flight to flee the country.

Arnold, who has been in detention since August 25, 2008, has maintained a not guilty plea in the trial stressing that he left the victim alive that night. He was caught at the Dubai International Airport on his return from 
the UK.

Even though the victim’s body has not been found, the Public Prosecution presented a series of evidence including DNA of blood sample taken from the back seat of the victim’s car which matched with DNA taken from her toothbrush. In addition, testimonies of witnesses were also part of the evidence. — mary@khaleejtimes.com