Mentally ill Brazilian Executed In Indonesia Was Unaware That He Was Being Put To Death In His Final Hours.

A mentally ill Brazilian executed in Indonesia was unaware that he was being put to death in his final hours, say his lawyer and priest.

Rodrigo Gularte, 42, was one of eight convicted drug smugglers killed by firing squad on Wednesday, despite pleas from his family that he was a paranoid schizophrenic.
He was arrested in 2004 while trying to enter Indonesia with 6kg of cocaine in his surfing gear.
Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff made repeated personal pleas for Indonesia to commute his sentence on humanitarian grounds because of his mental illness.
When Gularte was given 72 hours' notice of his execution, his lawyer, Ricky Gunawan, said his client was oblivious to what was happening.
"He had a delusional mind," Mr Gunawan told the AFP news agency.
"When we said your death sentence will be implemented, he said, 'What death sentence? I will not be sentenced to death'.
"I'm not sure whether he really 100% understood he would be executed."
When Mr Gunawan asked what his final requests were, he said the Brazilian was "just laughing".
He said Gularte asked him: "Is it just like Aladdin, when we ask for three wishes?
"When we tried to talk about the serious things ... he kept avoiding, to other silly things. He was calm, as if nothing was happening."
Gularte also believed the water in the prison was poisoned, his lawyer said.

Father Charlie Burrows - an Irish priest who counselled Gularte in his final days - said the Brazilian did not understand what was happening despite his efforts to explain.

"I thought he'd got the message he was to be executed but... when the chains started to go on, he said to me, 'Oh Father... am I being executed?'" Father Burrows told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

"He didn't get angry, he was annoyed.

"The big thing was, 'Oh, why is this happening, this is not right, I made a small mistake and why can't they just leave me in jail on the island and I won't give anybody any trouble'."

Father Burrows said Gularte continued to hear voices in his head.

"Everybody was being prepared for days before and everybody knew there was going to be an execution," he said.

"But because he hears these voices and he reckons because the voices told him, 'No, everything is going to be grand', he believes the voices more than he does anybody else."

Gularte, along with two Australians, four Nigerians and an Indonesian were put to death close to the prison on the island of Nusakambangan in Central Java.

The men refused to wear blindfolds, sang hymns and prayed as they went to their deaths.

Brazil expressed strong regret over Gularte's death as Indonesia faced a storm of international protest for killing the prisoners.

Australia has withdrawn its ambassador in protest at what it called "cruel and unnecessary" executions of Bali Nine duo Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran.

Indonesia has defended the executions as vital in its "war" on drugs.

Culled from Sky News.