PUTRAJAYA: There is no evidence to prove that cosmetics millionairess Datuk Sosilawati Lawiya and her three aides were murdered and burnt to death, the Court of Appeal here was told yesterday.
Lawyer Manjeet Singh Dhillon said the prosecution did not lead any evidence in the trial, direct or circumstantial that the alleged victims were dead or have been murdered.
“There is no evidence recovered from Lot 2001 (in Tanjung Sepat, Banting) that would be consistent with the alleged homicidal killing of four persons having taken place there,” he said, adding that there were also no bodies.
Manjeet Singh, who is representing former lawyer N. Pathmanabhan, also said that there was inconclusive evidence on whether the bones recovered were animal or human.
He said bone fragments recovered appeared to have been exposed to heat which was consistent with funerary cremains.
Manjeet Singh said the point which the bones were recovered were closed to the area where Hindu remains were cast in the sea and the area was subject to tidal movements and flooding from the sea.
“It cannot be denied that what we may have in court are the funerary remains of countless Hindus cast into the waters over generations which have been moved to this spot by the tidal movement of the waters,” he said.
He also submitted that the High Court judge misdirected himself when he wrongly admitted exhibits on the guilty plea of two men, U Suresh and K Sarawanan, who were respectively charged with burning the victims’ remains and disposing the ashes at Sungai Panchau.
Manjeet Singh said the exhibits were wrongly admitted into the trial and wrongly used as substantive or corroborative evidence.
He said Suresh, 28, and Sarawanan, 21, are still alive and were available to the prosecution to testify in the trial.
The duo are currently serving 20 years jail each for disposing of evidence related to the murder.
A three-member panel chaired by Justice Datuk Aziah Ali is hearing the appeal brought Pathmanabhan, 45, and farmhands T Thilaiyalagan, 23, R Matan, 24 and R Kathavarayan, 35 against their conviction and death sentence for the murder of Sosilawati, 47, bank officer Noorhisham Mohamad, 38, lawyer Ahmad Kamil Abdul Karim, 32, and Sosilawati’s driver Kamaruddin Shamsuddin, 44.
They were alleged to have committed the offence at Lot 2001, Jalan Tanjong Layang, Tanjung Sepat, in Banting between 8.30pm and 9.45pm on Aug 30, 2010.
Manjeet Singh also submitted that there was no money due or owing to Sosilawati because she had already collected her share of the initial payment for a sale of a land in Penang in Oct 2008.
“The trial judge erred in fact and in law when he departed from his own findings at the end of the prosecution case that the first appellant (Pathmanabhan) did not have money in his account to pay Sosilawati the money due from the sale of the Penang land,” he said.
Thilaiyalagan was represented by counsel Gurbachan Singh, Matan by counsel Amer Hamzah Arshad and Kathavarayan by counsel M Stanislaus Vethanayagam. The prosecution team was led by Deputy Public Prosecutor Ishak Mohd Yusoff.
The hearing continues today. — Bernama