Here in Los Angeles I frequently get postcards in the mail offering free weed delivery to my house. Across the Pacific Ocean, in Singapore, a 41-year-old Omar Yacob Bamadhaj will be executed by hanging for having weed.
He was caught with two pounds of cannabis in the trunk of his father's car as he was entering Singapore from Malaysia in 2018. He says his confession was forced because drug enforcement authorities threatened to hang his father and him.
Bamadhaj must have been extremely desperate to bring weed into Singapore, which has a zero-tolerance policy about recreational drugs. Singapore courts are well-known for their harsh sentences. Even a tiny amount of weed can result in a lengthy prison sentence.
From High Times:
Singapore is one of the worst places on the planet to get caught with pot. Singapore courts can dish out the death penalty to anyone caught with over 500 grams of cannabis—around 1,000 joints.
Singapore also doesn't hesitate to punish foreigners if they are caught with drugs, unlike other drug-free nations such as Saudi Arabia or China. In those countries, a foreigner caught with drugs would most likely be deported instead.
Singapore doesn't even need evidence of drug possession to jail a foreigner. Singapore might be the world's only country that will require drug tests to foreign nationals and then arrest anyone who fails the test.
