Leo Echegaray

11 July 1960 5 February 1999

THE FACTS
RAPED HIS 10 year old stepdaughter Rodessa in April 1994
Sentenced to death by the Supreme Court on June 25, 1996
Was about to be executed on January 4, 1999 but filed a motion for
reconsideration
Motion for Reconsideration was denied January 19, 1999
Finally executed on February 5, 1999
ECHEGARAY vs. SEC. OF JUSTICE (Jan. 19, 1999)

PUNO:
In 1922, the famous Clarence Darrow predicted that ".
. . the question of capital punishment had been the
subject of endless discussion and will probably never
be settled so long as men believe in punishment."
CONTINUED
...capital punishment has been regrettably blurred by
emotionalism because of the unfaltering faith of the pro and
anti-death partisans on the right and righteousness of their
postulates... when the debate deteriorates to discord due to
the overuse of words that wound, when anger threatens to
turn the majority rule to tyranny, it is the especial duty of
this Court to assure that the guarantees of the Bill of Rights
to the minority fully hold.