DAP says RCI report findings warrant new probe
By Shazwan Mustafa Kamal, The Malaysian Insider
The DAP wants a “high-level” special investigation team to find out the real cause of Teoh Beng Hock’s death, saying the Royal Commission of Inquiry’s (RCI) ruling of suicide was “speculation and not backed up by evidence.”
DAP parliamentary leader Lim Kit Siang charged today that the RCI report provides six reasons for a special probe to “bring to book” Teoh’s killers.
“These are revelations which would justify police re-opening investigations into TBH’s death to find out who gave Hishammuddin the sense of immunity and impunity for breaking laws and committing crimes, going over the head of his superior in Selangor and in national headquarters resulting in TBH’s death?” Lim said in a statement today.
The RCI had stipulated that Teoh, a DAP political aide, had committed suicide in 2009 as a result of “aggressive, relentless, oppressive and unscrupulous interrogation” by Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) officers, particularly former Selangor MACC deputy director Hishammuddin Hashim and enforcement officers Arman Alies and Mohd Ashraf Mohd Yunus
The officers, described in the RCI as “Arman the bully, Ashraf the abuser and HH the arrogant leader”, had wanted to pressure Teoh into becoming a witness in their case against his boss, Seri Kembangan assemblyman Ean Yong Hian Wah, for alleged abuse of public funds.
“The TBH RCI report is fertile source for the formulation of multiple perjury charges against Hishamuddin and other MACC officers in giving false testimony at the RCI — a judicial proceeding under the definition of Penal Code Section 193 which provides for the maximum sentence of seven years jail and fine on conviction.
“As the police had been lied to in police criminal investigations into TBH’s death, this means that all the police statements given by Hishammuddin and the MACC Selangor officers (except for Azeem and Azian) about what happened to TBH in his three interrogations in MACC from 6 pm on 15th July to 3.30 am on 16th July were untrue, worthless and must be rejected — justifying a re-opening of police investigations into TBH’s death,” he added.
The RCI had also found fault with the MACC’s techniques, saying that the graft officers assigned to Teoh’s case were not only brutal during interrogation but also had poor interview skills and viewed witnesses and suspects as “the enemy”.
The Ipoh Timur MP also said that RCI had stated that Teoh had been interrogated for a fourth time, between 3.30am and 7 am on July 16.
Paragraph 229 of the RCI report said “By the time, the fourth or final stage of the interrogation was over, TBH would have been almost a mental and physical wreck.”
“Police investigations into TBH’s death never knew about this “Fourth Interrogation” between 3.30 am to 7 am on July 16 – a second lead from the TBH RCI report on why police should re-open investigations.
“In fact, it should also investigate whether there was a “fifth” interrogation between 7 am to 11 am – depending on the time of TBH’s death,” added Lim.
The veteran leader said the special probe should also investigate into whether Hishammuddin had received specific instructions to carry out the “massive operation which resulted in the DAP aide’s death.
Lim also charged that based on evidence presented during the RCI hearings, MACC officers had already known about Teoh’s death by 1pm on July 16 — when the latter’s body was only found at 1.35pm.
