The Lebanese Center for Human Rights (CLDH) is a local non-profit, non-partisan Lebanese human rights organization in Beirut that was established by the Franco-Lebanese Movement SOLIDA (Support for Lebanese Detained Arbitrarily) in 2006. SOLIDA has been active since 1996 in the struggle against arbitrary detention, enforced disappearance and the impunity of those perpetrating gross human violations.

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June 26, 2012

The Daily Star - Closing arguments to begin in Sidon murder trial, June 26 2012


By Mohammad Zaatari
SIDON, Lebanon: Closing arguments are set to be made this week in the trial of the confessed killer of Sidon money changer Mohammad Natout, after lurid details of the crime emerged during an expedited trial in the South Lebanon Criminal Court.
Judge Rola Jadayel, the first head of the South Lebanon Criminal Court, decided Monday that lawyers of accused killer Nasser Fares, a Syrian national, and Natout’s family lawyers will deliver their final remarks Thursday before a verdict is issued. Fares faces the death penalty in a trial that has gripped the southern city.
Fares, 22, is accused of stabbing 67-year-old Natout inside his store in Februaryon the eastern Sidon highway and stealing $5,000 from the shop. Police arrested Fares in a taxi on the road to Syria from Aley. He confessed to the killing the same day.
Public outcry in Sidon was acute in the aftermath of the killing. Roads were blocked into the city and a petition for the death penalty for Natout’s killer was signed by several local politicians.
Sources close to the case told The Daily Star that Fares confessed to the crime again in court, also admitting to having sex twice in a brothel immediately after the killing before his attempt to flee to Syria.
Judicial experts say the trial has moved unusually quickly. Proceedings are usually stretched out over years before they reach the trial stage.
During the trial Monday two witnesses were questioned before Prosecutor General of the South, Samih Hajj, as well as the lawyers for Natout and Fares. Hajj asked for closing arguments to be delayed until Thursday.
If the verdict is the death penalty the case will be transferred to the Beirut Court of Cassesation. Over 50 executions have taken place in Lebanon since the country’s founding. Dozens of people are on death row, but recent years have seen a revival of efforts to abolish the penalty.

http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Local-News/2012/Jun-26/178204-closing-arguments-to-begin-in-sidon-murder-trial.ashx#axzz1ymctop8c

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