No certainty yet on transfer of doomed Filipina to Indon prison island
Video by Cathy Miranda/INQUIRER.net
The Law and Human Rights Ministry’s Central Java Office has said it is still waiting for a confirmed plan on the transfer of Mary Jane Fiesta Veloso, a Filipina on death row, from Wirogunan Penitentiary in Yogyakarta to the Nusakambangan prison island.
“We have not yet received information on when Mary Jane will be transferred to Nusakambangan,” the office’s head of correctional institution division, Yuspahruddin, said as quoted by Antara in Cilacap, Central Java, on Monday.
He said it was hoped that Veloso’s transfer could be conducted just shortly before the execution of her death sentence as correctional facilities on the prison island did not have a special block for female inmates.
Yuspahruddin said it was too risky for Veloso to wait too long on Nusakambangan.
READ: Execution of Filipina, other convicts won’t be this week, says Indon exec
Wirogunan Penitentiary warden Zainal Arifin said he also had not yet obtained details on Veloso’s transfer.
“Up till now, we still don’t know yet when Mary Jane will be transferred to Nusakambangan,” he said.
On the Wijayapura dock in Cilacap, Central Java, a number of journalists were seen to have gathered at the crossing gate to the Nusakambangan prison island on Monday following rumors Veloso’s imminent transfer.
“I’ve got information that Mary Jane will be transferred to Nusakambangan this week, but there is nothing special in Wijayapura. The situation remains normal,” said Heri Susanto, a journalist from a national television station.
Philippine convicted drug smuggler on death row Mary Jane Fiesta Veloso, is escorted by Indonesian police as she arrives at the court in Sleman in central Java island for a hearing of judicial review on March 3, 2015 after a plea for clemency was rejected by Indonesian President Joko Widodo. AFP
READ: Indonesian court rejects death row Filipina’s appeal
Another national television journalist, Andreas Sigit, said he was assigned by his reporting coordinator to monitor the visit of members of the families of death row inmates on Nusakambangan, as well as Veloso’s arrival.
“The situation has been quiet since this morning. There has been no arrival of death row inmate families,” he said.
Veloso, who was involved in trafficking 2.6 kilograms of heroin via Adi Sutjipto Airport in Yogyakarta, is one of several people to be imminently executed by the Attorney General’s Office.
Veloso filed for a second case review with the Sleman District Court after President Joko Widodo rejected her clemency request. The Supreme Court similarly rejected her second request.
