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Malaysia's federal court has dismissed Cambodia's ex-police chief
Heng Pov's application to cite three senior Malaysian government
officers for contempt for deporting him before he exhausted all his
avenues of appeal in Malaysia.
Chief Judge of Sabah and Sarawak Justice Richard Malanjum and
Federal Court judges Justices Hashim Mohd Yusoff and Azmel
Ma’amor unanimously dismissed his application to cite
Immigration Department enforcement director Datuk Ishak Mohamed and
the Attorney-General’s Chambers’ deputy head of
prosecution Mohd Hanafiah Zakaria for contempt.
The three-man bench also struck out his application to cite
Immigration Department director-general Datuk Wahid Mohd Don after
the deported ex-police chief’s counsel N. Sivananthan agreed
to remove him as a party to the application.
Justice Malanjum said there was undisputed fact that the two
officials had not breached any order from the Court of Appeal or
the Federal Court.
He said since this application was a quasi criminal matter, the
standard of proof required was beyond a reasonable doubt, which was
a heavy burden on Heng Pov.
On the application to cite Ishak, Justice Malanjum said the
enforcement director was acting according to the law even if he had
sped up the process and that did not amount to contempt.
As for Mohd Hanafiah, Justice Malanjum said Heng Pov’s
complaint was whether it was reasonable to believe that the deputy
head of prosecution had not spoken to Immigration officers after
the Court of Appeal's decision.
“We have considered the grievances complained by Heng Pov
and we are not satisfied beyond a reasonable doubt those
circumstances amounted to contempt,” he said.
Heng Pov, 53, who filed the action in January, had also accused
the officers of orchestrating his premature deportation to Cambodia
to serve an 18-year jail sentence for conspiring in the murder of a
municipal court judge there.
Heng Pov wanted the three senior officials to be cited for
contempt for deliberately suppressing the facts before the Court of
Appeal.
He was sent home on Dec 21 last year, and an urgent convening of
the Federal Court here was too late to stop his deportation.
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