SINGAPORE: Lawyer Charles Yeo and Malaysian non-profit organisation Attorneys for Liberty (LFL) were on Wed (Jul 27) purchased to pay costs after their unsuccessful efforts to challenge the particular death sentences of two drug traffickers.
The particular Court of Attractiveness ordered Mr Yeo to pay S$4, 500 to the Attorney-General plus Public Prosecutor, while LFL was ordered to pay S$1, 000 to the Public Prosecutor.
The Court of Appeal acquired dismissed two apps to set aside the death sentences of drug traffickers Roslan Bakar and Pausi Jefridin after hearings held in Feb.
Roslan and Pausi were found guilty and sentenced in order to death in 2010 for your capital offence associated with trafficking not less than 96. 07g of heroin (diamorphine). Their is of interest were dismissed this year.
Their latest challenges were filed in the days just before their scheduled accomplishments on Feb sixteen.
LFL joined up with Roslan and Pausi as a party within the first application, plus Mr Yeo represented them in both apps.
Mr Yeo had argued it turned out unconstitutional to carry out a death sentence on offenders suffering from significant mental disorder.
A High Court earlier heard evidence from experts that Roslan had an IQ associated with 74 and Pausi had an IQ of 67. These promises were disputed with the prosecution’s own experts.
That judge ultimately found that neither Roslan nor Pausi suffered from an abnormality of thoughts that impaired their responsibility for the offence committed.
The Court of Appeal dismissed the latest applications as no new evidence was produced regarding Roslan plus Pausi’s mental state. The judges found that there was no foundation to review their content.
When the idol judges questioned Mr Yeo about LFL’s desire for the proceedings, he said that the company was assisting Roslan and Pausi as it was against the passing away penalty.
Rejecting this reason, the court also made the finding that LFL had no position to be a party to the application form.
COSTS AGAINST CHARLES YEO
After the applications had been dismissed, the Attorney-General and Public Prosecutor applied for costs to become ordered against Mr Yeo and LFL.
They argued that Mr Yeo’s conduct in bringing the applications to the court was improper, citing serious procedural and substantive deficiencies in his submissions.
Additionally they argued that the programs were a “legal filibuster to anger and delay” the carrying out of Roslan and Pausi’s executions.
They requested the court in order to order S$25, 000 in costs towards Mr Yeo for that two applications.
Mr Yeo countered that he did not charge or earn any kind of fees for performing for Roslan and Pausi, and asked the court in order to order not more than S$2, 000 in expenses.
The judges found that Mr Yeo acted improperly in filing each applications when he had no material in order to justify them.
“As a qualified lawyer of four years’ standing, he must have known that it was their duty to determine regardless of whether there was any appropriate case to put forwards to the court – he could not just take action willy-nilly on the basis of their clients’ instructions or even desires, ” someone said.
The judges also considered their “sincere passion” to help his clients plus “youthful enthusiasm”, yet warned that this had been insufficient.
COSTS AGAINST LAWYERS INTENDED FOR LIBERTY
In regards to LFL, the Attorney-General argued that the company abused the court’s process and took part in the legal procedures to further its own reason for campaigning against the loss of life penalty.
The Attorney-General asked the court to order S$2, 000 in costs against the organisation.
LFL’s representative, Mr N Surendran, countered that the court’s power to order costs was “unconstitutional” and had an “oppressive” and “chilling” effect, based on court documents.
He or she argued that expenses orders had the particular “inevitable effect of stopping or intimidating NGOs… or concerned members of the public or lawyers from assisting or ensuring access to justice for your prisoners or their particular families”.
The particular judges rejected this argument, saying that Roslan and Pausi got “ample access” towards the courts and assistance from defence counsel, and that their cases received “exhaustive consideration”.
“Given the law of gravity of the right to a good trial and the significance of access to justice, accusations of breaches of the same which could impugn the criminal proper rights system ought never to be made lightly, ” they said.
They also highlighted that the power to order costs can simply be exercised when the application was careless, vexatious or otherwise an abuse of the process of the court.