Court restores ex-Perak immigration prosecution chief's conviction

Court of Appeal judge Noorin Badaruddin said the High Court judge had erred by treating procedural deficiencies as fatal to the prosecution’s case instead of weighing their evidential value. PUTRAJAYA: Former Perak immigration prosecution chief Zaidi Dali began serving a three-year jail term today after the Court of Appeal restored his conviction on bribery charges.

Justice Noorin Badaruddin, who chaired a three-member bench, said the High Court judge had wrongly treated procedural deficiencies as fatal to the prosecution’s case rather than weighing the evidential value.

Justices Meor Hashimi Abdul Hamid and Radzi Harun were the other members of the panel.

In her broad grounds, Noorin said the prosecution’s evidence had to be assessed cumulatively, taking into account the sequence of events surrounding a meeting on Nov 5, 2020, rather than viewing individual pieces of evidence in isolation.

She said Zaidi’s alleged role in soliciting RM10,000 a month to protect an entertainment centre from immigration inspections did not depend solely on whether he had personally uttered the words attributed to another participant.

The court also ruled that audio and video recordings relied on by the prosecution were admissible, as they were not intercepted communications requiring a certificate under the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission Act 2009.

It further found that the evidence concerning the RM7,000 bribe remained coherent despite the absence of an eyewitness to every movement of the money.

In 2022, the sessions court sentenced Zaidi and then Perak immigration director Zulhairin Yahya to three years’ imprisonment and fined each of them RM85,000.

The High Court in Ipoh acquitted both men last year. The prosecution appealed, but later withdrew its appeal against Zulhairin following his death earlier this year.

The men had been accused of conspiring to protect an entertainment centre in Manjung from enforcement raids in exchange for monthly payments of RM10,000.

M Athimulan and R Vikramanan represented Zaidi, while deputy public prosecutors Farah Ezlin Yusop Khan, Maziyah Mansor and Qistini Qamarul Abrar appeared for the prosecution.