DPP detained for corruption
(The Star) – The Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) detained a senior deputy public prosecutor, Mohd Azhar Irwan, for allegedly taking bribes and tampering with evidence.
The suspect, in his late 30s, was detained in Shah Alam at around 6.30pm on Thursday by a team of officers from the commission’s Selangor office following a tip-off.
It is learnt that the deputy public prosecutor had received an undisclosed amount of money from another person who is being investigated by police under the Dangerous Drugs Act.
It is also believed that the deputy public prosecutor, married to a civil servant, had allegedly tampered with some of the evidence.
The commission’s chief commissioner, Datuk Seri Ahmad Said Hamdan, said the deputy public prosecutor was released on bail yesterday.
He declined to elaborate on details of the case.
In George Town, an Immigration officer and 18 people have been detained in connection with a syndicate that masterminded the exit of illegal foreign workers without documents.
MACC officers arrested the suspects, including 15 Bangladeshi illegal workers and three middlemen, at Penang International Airport at 7am yesterday.
The Bangladeshis, who had just been “cleared” to board a plane for Bangkok, and middlemen, all aged between 20 and 40, were detained at the departure lounge.
All of them, who had no travelling documents, were scheduled to catch a connecting flight to Dhaka from Bangkok.
A source said the syndicate was part of an international ring dealing in transborder human trafficking activities.
“The arrest is only the tip of the iceberg,” said the commission’s state director, Latifah Md Yatim.
A special team conducted a two-month surveillance at the airport and other parts of the island to track the movement of the syndicate members and Bangladeshis.
Latifah said the three middlemen were accompanying the illegal workers to their destination.
She said investigations showed that the illegal workers paid between RM1,000 and RM2,000 each to the syndicate to leave the country without travel documents.
She said the Immigration officer was working in cohorts with the syndicate members by allowing them to move freely out of the airport without documents.
She declined to reveal if more immigration officers are involved but said the department had been alerted to the arrest.
