Thursday 28 Mar 2024
By
main news image

(Oct 23): The Court of Appeal today allowed carpet dealer Deepak Jaikishan's application to set aside a consent order to reinstate a RM2 million suit by the widow of a key witness in the Altantuya Shaariibuu murder trial.

A three-man bench led by judge Vernon Ong Lam Kiat said the consent order obtained by widow A. Santamil Selvi on October 2 was tantamount to setting aside a High Court ruling made last December.

Ong then fixed November 20 to hear the merit of Santamil's appeal, and ordered Deepak and Santamil's lawyers to file their written submissions before November 6.

Deepak's lawyer Shahir Ab Razak told the bench today the consent order must be set aside because his client was not given the opportunity to make a submission on the merit of the appeal.

Lawyer Americk Sidhu, representing Santamil, replied that the consent order was made after a submission.

"I had put in a written submission to the court and extended a copy to Deepak. He consented after reading the content," Americk said.

Deepak, who was unrepresented previously, said he would be seriously prejudiced if a trial was held.

The consent order would result in a trial and allow Santamil to prove her case against several defendants, including Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak and his wife Datin Seri Rosmah Mansor.

The case was recalled after counsel Rishwant Singh, appearing for senior lawyer Tan Sri Cecil Abraham and his son Sunil, wrote a complaint letter to Court of Appeal president Tan Sri Md Raus Sharif that the order was defective in law.

They said the order was tantamount to reversing the High Court ruling last December to strike out Santamil’s suit against the defendants.

In June last year, Santamil filed the suit on behalf of the estate of her husband P. Balasubramaniam, who died of a heart attack on March 15, 2013, soon after his return from India.

That suit would expose the roles of several people in sending Santamil’s family into exile following controversies surrounding two statutory declarations by Bala involving Altantuya and Najib.

This also included why Bala was forced to retract his first sworn statement highlighting Najib’s alleged involvement with Altantuya, and why Bala and his family were forced to leave the country in 2008 for almost five years.

Last December, High Court judge Datuk Hasnah Mohamed Hashim allowed an application to strike out the widow's suit by Najib, Rosmah, the prime minister’s brothers Datuk Johari and Datuk Nazim, Cecil, Sunil, commissioner of oath Zainal Abidin Muhayat and lawyer M. Arulampalam.

Hasnah said Santamil lacked the capacity to file for action on behalf of her husband’s estate and her pleadings were not according to law.

The Court of Appeal in April this year upheld the High Court decision on the grounds that Santamil’s notice of appeal was defective.

However, Deepak was not a respondent in Santamil’s appeal in the Court of Appeal.

Deepak had said he was not a voluntary party to strike out Santamil’s suit in the High Court.

In the suit, the family said the defendants, including Deepak, had caused Bala’s second statutory declaration to be drafted without instructions from him and further caused him to sign it “under threat and inducement”.

Bala and his family left Malaysia after he signed the second statutory declaration in 2008 to denounce the first one he had made the day before.

The second statement cleared the prime minister of involvement in the case.

Cecil was referred before the Advocates and Solicitors Disciplinary committee for professional misconduct over the drafting of the second statutory declaration. – The Malaysian Insider

 

      Print
      Text Size
      Share