The Kuala Lumpur High Court has ruled out conducting a hybrid online trial for Najib Abdul Razak’s RM2.28 billion 1MDB corruption case.
However, judge Collin Lawrence Sequerah said that the court does not rule out the possibility of doing so in the future.
The judge made the ruling this morning over the prosecution’s application for the former prime minister's case to be conducted via hybrid online proceedings due to the accused not being allowed into court over his yellow MySejahtera status.
“On the application for a hybrid hearing, after considering submissions from parties, I, for now, have decided against proceedings via online hybrid, but I would not rule it out in future,” Sequerah said.
Najib was not present in open court today as he was still a Covid-19 casual contact and his MySejahtera status remains yellow.
Yesterday, Najib was barred from entering the High Court at the Kuala Lumpur Courts Complex because of this, leading to the vacating of the 1MDB trial initially scheduled that day.
The Kuala Lumpur Courts Complex generally only allows those with low-risk or blue status to enter the premises.
Due to Najib not being allowed into court, deputy public prosecutor Ahmad Akram Gharib yesterday had applied for the court to conduct the trial via hybrid online proceedings, whereby the accused and his defence team could follow the hearing via Zoom from another location, while Sequerah and the prosecution can be on-site at the High Court.
However, defence counsel Hariharan Tara Singh yesterday objected to the application, submitting that the court would be in a better position to evaluate questions of law and facts when the trial is conducted on-site.
Others also barred from entering court
Najib’s lead defence counsel Muhammad Shafee Abdullah and a large number of the defence team were also Covid-19 casual or close contacts with reflective MySejahtera status.
Shafee was not present at court today as well since his MySejahtera status is orange for being a close contact.
The trial is set to resume on Thursday.
On Tuesday and Wednesday last week, the Court of Appeal at the Palace of Justice, Putrajaya, carried out hybrid online criminal proceedings related to Najib's RM42 million SRC International corruption appeal.
The proceedings saw the Court of Appeal judges and prosecution team being present at the Palace of Justice, while Najib and his defence team followed proceedings via Zoom from another location.
This was due to Najib and large numbers of his defence team coming in close contact with a Covid-19 positive person.
Since the Covid-19 outbreak hit Malaysian shores last year, the civil jurisdiction courts have conducted many case managements and hearings fully online.
However, by comparison, the criminal jurisdiction courts generally still try for the most part to conduct trials in open court.
Concerning the ongoing graft trial before Sequerah, Najib is facing four charges of abuse of power and 21 counts of money laundering involving RM2.28 billion of 1MDB's funds.
1MDB is fully owned by the Minister of Finance Incorporated.
Besides being a former premier, the accused also used to be finance minister and chairperson of 1MDB's board of advisors.
The prosecution contended that fugitive businessperson Jho Low, on the behest of Najib, had acted with several other 1MDB personnel to misappropriate billions of ringgit of funds from the sovereign wealth fund and used a circuitous and complex financial route to transfer part of the funds to the then premier's personal bank account.
However, the defence team contended that Najib had no knowledge about wrongdoing at 1MDB and that Low and several other members of the sovereign wealth fund entirely masterminded the affair. - Mkini
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.