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- Police acted as judge, jury in custodial death case – Bernama
Police took on the roles of judge and jury over a complaint lodged against their behaviour in the case of luxury car theft suspect A. Kugan, who died in police custody, about five years ago.
The Court of Appeal in its 51-page of written judgment said this conduct missed the point completely which was the police force, at that point, was "on trial".
"And, to allow the police to determine what ought to be done was simply asking the wrong-doers to do their own investigation and determine the appropriate action.
"Common sense militates against such a course of action," said justice Datuk David Wong Dak Wah, in the judgment released today.
He said the panel was also perturbed by the admission of first defendant (Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar [pic], former Selangor police chief and current inspector-general of police) that he had negotiated with the attorney-general that investigation was to be confined to an offence under Section 330 of the Penal Code.
The section deals with offences of voluntarily causing hurt to extort confession or to compel restoration of property.
Wong said this was an affront to the concept of fair play and transparency, however, what appeared to have had happened was that the police had become judge and jury of a complaint made against their behaviour.
In a unanimous ruling, the panel headed by justice Datuk Mohamad Ariff Md Yusof, which also comprised of justice Datuk Mah Weng Kwai, held that where there was custodial death, the family of the deceased was entitled to know the truth as to what had happened during the detention.
"That is their intrinsic right to know. This entitlement to know can be easily understood by just asking the simple question: what if it is your 22-year-old son who had died in custody?" asked Wong.
He said custodial death could not and should not happen in the country and that there should be zero tolerance to any custodial death at all remand centres. – Bernama, August 11, 2014.
