Man cries foul after cops force him to show WhatsApp at teh tarik stall

Cheras police today justified briefly detaining a man at the police station after he refused to show officers the content of his mobile phone while he was having teh tarik at a stall at Jalan Cheras Utama.

He was approached at the stall as officers suspected the man had placed a 4D bet online illegally via the WhatsApp phone application, said district police chief Muhammad Idzam Jaafar.

“When police wanted to inspect his mobile phone in detail, the man refused to cooperate and left the place to his relative’s home,” he said.

He added that police then tailed the man and brought him to the Cheras Police Station, whereupon checks, the WhatsApp application was “uninstalled”.

He was then released because there was no evidence that he was betting online illegally.

Idzam was responding to a Twitter thread by the man, who uses the Twitter handle SimpletonED.

Plainclothes police 

Relating his four-hour ordeal on Saturday, the man said plainclothes police had randomly approached him while he was having teh tarik at a stall 200m from his mother’s home.

He said they introduced themselves as police and demanded to see his identity card and inspect his mobile phone.

He said the officer told him he could hold the phone as the officer only wanted to look at the contents.

He said he complied by opening the WhatsApp application as asked, but took his phone away when the officer started by typing the word “mkt” in the search function of the application.

Upon seeing many messages with the word “mkt”, the officer insisted that he follows him to the police station but he refused, the man alleged.

The man said when he tried to leave, a group of about six to eight men, said to also be police officers, tried to stop him from entering his vehicle and tried to seize his mobile phone.

“I was surrounded by these officers like they were gangsters, not police,” he said.

The man claimed “mkt” is a common short term for market, but district police chief Idzam said it is a known short term for 4D betting services.

“Police won’t inspect someone’s mobile phone for no reason...

“He claimed he only knows ‘mkt’ to be (a short form for) ‘market’. This is ridiculous.

“We know ‘mkt’ is an acronym for (betting products) ‘Magnum, Kuda (and Toto)’. 

“When he ran away from the police, he managed to delete the application and get rid of the evidence,” he told Free Malaysia Today.

Barred from entering his mother’s house

Meanwhile, the man said the officers tailed him to his mother’s house, barred him from entering the home and insisted he follows them to the police station.

“Two more patrol cars arrived as if to intimidate me like in the dramas when there is a big case.

“But I still wasn’t told what my offence was and was just threatened to be taken to the station, without a warrant,” he said in the Twitter thread which has been shared by more than 1,000 social media users.

After some time, he finally relented to be taken to the station in a police SUV with the siren on.

At the station, his phone was taken for inspection and it was returned to him after an hour, he said. He was then sent home and released without charge.

“How many others have been bullied and threatened using police powers? Spread this awareness that we should not just hand over our private property just because we were threatened,” he said.

Multiple social users responded by saying that they, too, had similar experiences of having their mobile phones inspected by the authorities, and were similarly let off after inspections found no evidence of wrongdoing.

Right to inspect

In a video statement, lawyer Syahredzan Johan said police have the right to inspect mobile phones if they suspect something illegal has been done.

“If the police have detained or arrested us, police have the right to gain access to our phone even if our phone is password-protected or locked.

“But if we are not detained or they don’t suspect we have done anything wrong, and they just want to have a look in our phones, this is not allowed by the law.

“Under the law, there is no need to give our phone to the police if we are not under investigation or suspected of having committed an offence,” he said. - Mkini