Siti Zainab Binti Duhri Rupa

SAUDI ARABIA EXECUTES INDONESIAN WOMAN WITH SUSPECTED MENTAL ILLNESS

April 14, 2015: Today’s execution of an Indonesian woman with a suspected mental illness is just the latest in the recent macabre spike in Saudi Arabia’s state-sponsored killings, Amnesty International said.
Saudi Arabian state media reported that Siti Zainab Binti Duhri Rupa was executed this morning in Medina. She was sentenced to death in 1999 after she “confessed” in police custody to killing a woman who had allegedly mistreated her since hiring her as a domestic worker the year before.
The authorities waited for more than 15 years for the youngest of the victim’s children to reach adulthood to decide whether or not the family would want to pardon Siti Zainab or demand her execution under qisas (retribution).
According to sources in Indonesia, in November 1999 Siti Zainab admitted to stabbing her female employer 18 times, because of alleged “mistreatment”. Before her arrest, she had sent two letters in which she said that her employer and her employer’s son had been cruel to her.
Siti Zainab reportedly made this “confession” during police interrogation, and was subsequently sentenced to death. (Sources: amnesty.org, 14/04/2015)