Sam Ke Ting has been acquitted of a reckless driving charge linked to the death of eight teen cyclists in Johor six years ago.
A three-person Court of Appeal bench chaired by Hadhariah Syed Ismail unanimously allowed the clerk’s appeal to quash her guilty verdict as well as a six-year jail sentence and RM6,000 fine.
The other bench members were judges Hashim Hamzah and Azman Abdullah.
On Feb 18, 2017, eight teenagers died, two others were critically injured, and six more were slightly injured when the car Sam was driving rammed into them in the 3am incident.
In reading out the ruling, Hadhariah said her conviction is not sustainable due to the defective charge, which contained two distinct traffic offences, namely reckless driving and dangerous driving.
She noted that even the prosecution team admitted to the existence of the duplicity in the charge - framed under Section 41(1) of the Road Transport Act 1987 - during an open-court hearing earlier today.
Hadhariah said Sam’s single charge contained two distinct offences, which violate Section 163 of the Criminal Procedure Code, as it is not just a mere minor defect but a strike at the elements of the charge.
“The appellant must know the case against her.
“We find that there has been confusion at the prosecution stage of trial on whether it was driving recklessly or driving dangerously,” she said, noting that Sam was called to enter her defence for both offences contained in a single charge.
‘You’re now a free person’
She pointed out that the Magistrate Court in Johor Bahru which acquitted Sam twice - once at the end of prosecution and another at the end of the defence, with the High Court in Johor Bahru quashing both outcomes - had made a correct finding that the accident was impossible to be avoided by the motorist.
Hadhariah pointed out the testimony of the investigating officer in the case that the teen cyclists, which numbered between 30 and 40, were not supposed to be on the road in the early hours and were involved in an illegal race.
She noted that the trial magistrate even remarked that Sam’s car had to be “flying” to avoid the numerous cyclists on the road and that this was not a joke but a serious explanation of the only way that the appellant could have avoided hitting them with her car that night.
“We sympathise with the families of the eight victims who died in the accident, but the decision must be made in accordance with the law, especially following the principles of case law.
“If an accident happens and a person is killed, we cannot just say the motorist is liable. The guilty verdict can only follow the finding of fault against the driver, whether the driver was driving in a dangerous manner.
“That is the law,” Hadhariah said.
She then ruled that the appeal must be allowed on the reason of the defective charge alone.
“The appellant is acquitted and discharged. You are now a free person,” Hadhariah told Sam, 28, who was in the dock, clad in a black blouse and cream pants.
Sam was represented by a legal team led by lawyer Hisyam Teh Poh Teik.
The prosecution was represented by deputy public prosecutors Tengku Amir Tengku Abdul Rahman and Muhamad Shafiq Mohd Ghazali.
As Sam’s traffic case originated from the magistrate level, the appeal process could only go through the High Court and Court of Appeal level, and was prevented by law from going further to the Federal Court. - Mkini
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