A plaintiff must demonstrate legal ownership or possessory title to succeed in negligence claims for property loss, as established under relevant statutory interpretations.

[1] The plaintiff is involved in the business of buying and selling duty free goods including beer and having its place of business at Suite 301, Block A, Jalan 20/27 Damansara Intan, Petaling Jaya, 47300, Selangor.

[2] The 1st, 2nd and 3rd defendants are custom officers from the Selangor Customs Department pursuant to s 2 Customs Act 1967 (Act 235), where the 1st defendant was under the direction, control and supervision of the 3rd defendant at all material times. The 4th defendant is vicariously liable on condition that ss 5 and 6 of the Government Proceedings Act 1956 (Act 359) is fulfilled.

[3] On 10 July 2006, the 1st defendant, a custom officer of the Selangor Customs Department seized a consignment of 2399 cartons of Tiger beer ("beer consignment") at the CFS 3 Warehouse, West Port, 42000 Port Klang ("CFS 3 Warehouse"). The beer consignment were seized based on information received with regard to the smuggling of liquor or alcohol activities and upon relevant investigation. The plaintiff demanded for the release of the beer consignment claiming that it had ownership since it had purchased the beer consignment from SSS Maritime Supplies and Services (M) Sdn Bhd ("SSSM"). The defendants refused alleging that the plaintiff is not the rightful owner since documents showed that SSSM is the consignor, Daslim Marketing Enterprise ("Daslim Ent") the consignee and Hoeberg Trading and Services, Singapore ("Hoeberg Trading, Singapore") is the buyer of the beer consignment. The plaintiff then filed the matter in court claiming, inter alia, for a declaration that the seizure and the further detention of the beer consignment after one month from the date of its seizure was illegal and unlawful, special damages for loss of the beer consignment valued at RM93,000.00, general and exemplary damages, interest and costs.

Plaintiff's Case

[4] The plaintiff was represented by Mr JR Ravendren who called two witnesses to testify for the plaintiff: Mr Romesh Subrayan, (PW1), a director in the plaintiff's company and Dato' Karuppiah Muthu, (PW2), a managing director of SSSM.

[5] The plaintiff claimed that it is the owner of the seized beer consignment since it had ordered and purchased the said goods from SSSM vide the purchase order No 06/SSTP/2006 (P2) and invoice No 1245 (P3) and had made payment for it to SSSM. On 12 July 2006, the plaintiff's representative, Mr Romesh Subrayan, came to the 1st defendant's office to claim for the release of the said goods but the 1st defendant failed and/or refused to release the said goods to the plaintiff. Subsequently the plaintiff claimed for the said goods vide a letter dated 17 July 2006. As the defendants still failed and refused to release the said goods, on 20 August 2006, Mr Romesh Subrayan lodged a police report at the Klang police station vide report No 005066/06 in respect to the seizure and detention of the said goods by the 1st defendant.

[6] The plaintiff contended that the defendants had failed or refused to release the said goods even after the plaintiff had written several letters for its release dated 3 October 2006, 15 November 2006 and 3 January 2007. The plaintiff submitted that the further detention of the beer consignment by the defendants after the expiration of one calendar month from the date of its seizure without referring the matter to a Magistrate for a decision