KUALA LUMPUR: Five months ago, six men, including a doctor, were ordered to be hanged for the murder of deputy public prosecutor Kevin Morais.
Their lawyers filed a notice of appeal against their conviction and sentence but the appeal process has stalled because trial judge Azman Abdullah has yet to provide his written grounds.
According to a court practice direction, a trial judge must prepare the grounds of judgment within eight weeks after the appellant files an appeal.
Lawyer N Sivananthan said that in the present case, he had written to the judge to obtain the grounds before he can file the petition of appeal to the Court of Appeal.
“We are unable to state where the judge had erred in the petition as the judgment is not forthcoming,” said the lawyer, who is appearing for former military doctor R Kunaseegaran.
R Dinishwaran, AK Thinesh Kumar, M Vishwanath, S Nimalan and S Ravi Chandaran were also convicted of murdering Morais on Sept 4, 2015 between Jalan Dutamas Raya Sentul in Kuala Lumpur and No. 1, Jalan USJ 1/6D, Subang Jaya.
In one of the longest trials, delayed due to a host of reasons like change of lawyers, the verdict was delivered after four-and-a-half years.
Lawyer Muhammad Rafique Rashid Ali said a written judgment in a death penalty case must be written expeditiously as the accused person would be languishing in prison pending the appeal outcome.
Bail is not allowed in offences that carry the death penalty and no compensation is allowed should one be successful in the final appeal.
Rafique said a trial judge was a trier of fact and the observation of witness’ demeanour was important. “The audio visual advantage will be lost if there is a delay in writing the judgment,” he added.
Lawyer KA Ramu said some judgments in criminal cases were delivered much later due to the complexity of the issues in the trial.
“Appeals were heard more than two years late, because the grounds were delivered late,” he said, adding that in such cases appellate judges had to also rely on notes of evidence to dispense justice.
Ramu said the eight-week deadline to prepare judgment for appeal may appear rigid as judges serving in Selangor and Kuala Lumpur may be overburdened with cases.
However, he said, inordinate delays in providing judgments had resulted in accused persons having their sentence reduced or acquitted.
Lawyer Jayaseelan Anthony said justice in criminal cases was both to the accused and the victim who is represented by the public prosecutor.
“There must be no miscarriage of justice just because inferior quality judgment is dished out, because it is written months after the conclusion of the trial,” he added.