Azalina: Courts awarded RM1.54m to families of custodial death victims

 

The courts have awarded families of custodial death victims a total of RM1.54 million across three separate civil suits between 2016 and 2022.

Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department (Law and Institutional Reform) Azalina Othman Said said all three cases have been resolved.

“The courts have set compensation to the families of the victims totalling RM1.54 million for all the cases.

“However, the police cannot be sure whether the compensation money has been paid to the victims’ next of kin or if there is still an appeal from the lawyers,” she said in a written parliamentary reply.

The minister was responding to Ipoh Barat MP M Kulasegaran who had asked for the total amount of compensation the government paid to the families of custodial death victims in that time.

Kulasegaran also asked for a list of offenders in such cases and whether action has been taken against them.

Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Azalina Othman Said

Azalina said action had been taken against two police officers who were charged under Section 330 of the Penal Code.

Section 330 deals with whoever “voluntarily causes hurt for the purpose of extorting from the sufferer… any confession or information which may lead to the detection of an offence or misconduct”.

The offenders may be punished with up to seven years’ jail and be liable to a fine. - Mkini