Death penalty case stirs Puerto Rico

By BBC's Stephen Gibbs

A murder trial in the Caribbean island of Puerto Rico is prompting protests over the extent of United States federal influence on the American territory.

Puerto Rico banned capital punishment in 1929

US prosecutors are seeking the death penalty in the case, although capital punishment is banned by the island's constitution.

The trial involves a gruesome murder. The two defendants are accused of kidnapping a grocer as he left his store in the island's capital, San Juan, one night in 1998.

They demanded $1m ransom, but when they found the police were investigating the case they are alleged to have shot the man, hacked his body to bits and left the pieces strewn along a roadside.

What has alarmed Puerto Ricans is not just the details of the case itself, but the fact that it has prompted an attempt by the US Government to impose the death penalty on their island.

Culture clash

Puerto Rico - a self-governing commonwealth of the US - banned capital punishment in 1929.

But American prosecutors have successfully argued that this case is serious enough to enable federal law to be applied.

The decision appears to be opposed by the majority of Puerto Ricans.

Religious and community organisations have vowed to fight it to the very end, describing capital punishment as an affront to their culture.

But US prosecutors seem unmoved, even giving details of where the two men will die if successfully convicted.

They would be transferred to a prison in the US state of Indiana and killed by lethal injection.