A belt and braces execution in Riyadh

Today I read an article on DigitalJournal.com. It was my first time visiting their website, which I was drawn to by the bold headline: Sudanese man beheaded and crucified in Saudi Arabia.

Someone unfamiliar with the punitive norms of the closed kingdom may think that such a headline refers to some sort of gruesome act of retribution by one criminal gang to another. Sadly not. The Sudanese man was in fact put to death by the state following his conviction of rape, murder, theft and arson. Granted, assuming the defendant was guilty, he committed a vile series of crimes which deserve harsh punishment. Indeed, some states in the USA would execute one of their own citizens for committing a similar series of crimes.

My question is simple: why did the guilty man have to be beheaded and crucified? According to DigitalJournal.com, the Sudanese man was first beheaded after which his head was reconnected to his body. He was then crucified; a belt and braces approach to execution if ever I saw one. 

To me, beheading and then crucifying goes way beyond a strict judicial system. Such an approach is simple thuggery and smacks of the mafia-style tribal warfare which peppered the Arabian Peninsula before Abdulaziz Ibn Saud created the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia shortly after the beginning of the twentieth Century.

I think it's time the country's judicial system officials have a think a about the message they are passing on to their own people, and to the rest of the world. There is no need for a belt and braces approach to execution. If Saudi Arabia insist on retaining the death penalty, they should at least do so in a responsible manner.