Pregnancy may help Briton avoid firing squad: Laos

[Coventina]

Source: AFP

HANOI (AFP) — A British woman facing trial in Laos on a drug charge may escape the death penalty because she is pregnant, a Lao government spokesman said on Tuesday.

Samantha Orobator, 20, was detained in August after allegedly being caught with 680 grams (1.5 pounds) of heroin while she was trying to board a plane to Thailand.

Normally, anyone found in Laos with more than 500 grams of heroin faces the death penalty, which the communist country has in the past carried out by firing squad.

"But another provision of the law also provides that any pregnant (woman) will not be sentenced to the death penalty," said the government spokesman, Khenthong Nuanthasing.



Read more: http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5itrC_jcAecRwWQEiUITHk3BAonxw

[brooklynite]

1. Does that apply only until the Baby's born?

[happyslug]

2. Under the traditional English Common law rule, yes, but

Given the three to six months one can plead "her belly" gives her family time to arrange some other solution i.e. pay off the victim. The Pirate Anne Bonnie did this successfully and avoid the noose while her lover, Calico Jack was hanged.

More on Anne Bonny:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anne_Bonny

More on "Pleading her Belly":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pleading_the_belly

Most (but NOT all) women who "plead their belly" had their sentences subsequently commuted. It also appears to be used to give the woman's family more time to arrange some sort of commutation of the Sentence (and appears to have been granted on a liberal basis, even to women who were NOT pregnant if the Judge did not want her hanged).

I suspect the same thing in Laos, this is to give her family and Britain more time to come up with money to compensate the state for the cost of her trial and imprisonment.