The mother of Nagaenthran K Dharmalingam, a Malaysian inmate in Singapore, has filed a final legal challenge in Singapore’s Court of Appeal today to set aside his conviction and death sentence, according to Lawyers for Liberty chief coordinator Zaid Malek.
The hearing is set for 2.30pm tomorrow, on the eve of his execution.
Malek, in a statement, said Panchalai Supermaniam had personally filed the legal challenge with the help of friends and activists after being unable to obtain the services of a lawyer in Singapore.
“It has become very difficult to secure the services of Singaporean lawyers to take such legal challenges because lawyers have been consistently penalised and heavily fined by the Attorney-General’s Chambers and judiciary for doing so, resulting in Panchalai having to file the case herself in the court registry.
“The basis of the legal challenge is that Judge Sundaresh Menon who presided over and dismissed Nagaenthiran’s appeals was also the AG who prosecuted Nagaenthiran and secured his conviction. This is a blatant denial of fair trial and unheard of in the Commonwealth judicial systems,” he said.
He added that Panchalai will also be unrepresented at tomorrow’s hearing.
Presiding judge is AG who prosecuted Nagaenthran
One of Nagaenthran’s lawyers, N Surendran, claimed a conflict of interest involving Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon.
In a letter addressed to Singapore Attorney-General Lucien Wong, Surendran said Nagaenthran was denied the right to a fair trial and claimed that Sundaresh had presided over appeals from Nagaenthran on two occasions.
When Nagaenthran was convicted in 2010 and had his sentence affirmed in 2011, Sundaresh was Singapore’s attorney-general at the time.
Nagaenthran is a 33-year-old mentally impaired Malaysian, who was sentenced for a drug trafficking offence in Singapore.
He has been on death row for more than a decade for trafficking about 42.7g of heroin into Singapore, which has some of the world's toughest narcotics laws.
His lawyers say he has a mild intellectual disability due to his lower-than-average IQ of 69.
Nagaenthran was scheduled to hang on Nov 10 last year but was granted a stay of execution on Nov 8 after his Singaporean lawyer M Ravi filed an 11th-hour constitutional challenge.
Although the Singaporean High Court dismissed the challenge, it allowed an appeal to the Court of Appeal.
The appeal was supposed to be heard in November but was postponed to March this year when Nagaenthran tested positive for Covid-19 on Nov 9, 2021.
However, his appeal was again rejected on March 29 this year.
Nagaenthran's case has garnered significant attention from international media, with particular attention on Singapore's move to execute someone with an intellectual disability. - Mkini
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