Eric Paulsen said there should be no exceptions to abolishing the death penalty, which he referred to as a “state-sanctioned murder”.

Ramkarpal, who is also DAP’s Bukit Gelugor MP, had earlier said that even though he had always advocated doing away with the death penalty, he was in favour of the sentence being meted out on those found guilty of committing horrific crimes against children.

His comments came in the wake of the death of 11-month-old Nur Muazara Ulfa Mohammad Zainal on Friday.

Police have arrested a couple, after a post-mortem showed the baby could have been raped, sodomised and abused.

But Paulsen said it still did not justify the death penalty.

“There is nothing to be gained by killing another person even though he or she may have committed a heinous crime,” he said.

“All it shows is that we are a society that is bent on retribution and punishment instead of reform and mercy.”

However, he said those convicted of serious crimes should be put away with long prison sentences.

Lawyer Latheefa Koya, meanwhile, said that judicial punishment should be more about deterrence rather than “cold-blooded vengeance”.

“It has been proven that the death penalty does not deter serious crimes,” said Latheefa, who heads Lawyers for Liberty.

She said life imprisonment was a more dreadful punishment.

“In fact some prisoners prefer to die, than spend their life in prison,” she added.