The court confirmed that police notices under s 111 CPC are lawful, legitimate, and necessary for investigations, and that the Attorney General has no authority over such police procedures.

JUDGMENT

Kamaludin Md Said JCA:

Introduction

[1] This is the appellant's appeal against the decision of the High Court which has dismissed his application in encl 1 to set aside and/or strike out the Notices under s 111 of the Criminal Procedure Code dated 15 June 2020 and 17 August 2020. The appellant is also seeking a stay of any warrant of arrest to be issued against him for failing to comply with the notices.

Facts Of The Case

[2] The appellant averred in his affidavit in support of his application dated 21 August 2020 that he had been a lawyer for the past 28 years. He had recently taken on a case representing two widows, where their husbands were in a party of three men shot dead by the police. The wife of the third man was allegedly at the scene too and had gone missing. The appellant disputed the police's version of events and had written nine letters to the police which received no response. His last letter was dated 10 June 2020, titled "Indian Lives Matter in Malaysia Civil Suit Prosecute Police Crime and Racial Injustices: Hindraf 2.0 170 days police kidnap cum shot dead Moganambal and 3 others' ala George Floyd, USA". The appellant received a message from the 1st respondent to his mobile phone, which read "Selamat petang tuan. Saya Inspektor Fairol dari Unit Siasatan Jenayah Terkelas, Bukit Aman ... jika dapat sms ini ... minta hubungi saya semula". The 1st respondent had called the appellant twice, on 13 June 2020 and on 15 June 2020, presumably because the appellant did not respond to the message. The appellant chose not to answer the calls but sent a message to the 1st respondent saying "Please write in officially. Thank you". The 1st respondent replied stating that he merely wanted to serve a notice under s 111 of the CPC . The 1st respondent did serve the s 111 notice on the appellant through an e-mail and WhatsApp on the same day ("the 1st notice"). The appellant averred that he was taken aback to discover that the 1st notice was about another case that he handled, concerning a destitute Indian family, which had since been reported by a local Tamil newspaper. He then instructed his solicitors to send a letter to the Attorney General to review and reconsider the 1st notice. That led to nothing as he was served personally with another s 111 notice on 17 August 2021 ("the 2nd notice"). The appellant averred that he was unable to carry out his duties as an advocate and solicitor without fear or favour in light of what he claimed to be the police's alleged persecution against him.

[3] The respondents in their affidavit in reply dated 27 October 2020 affirmed by the 1st respondent denied all the allegations and maintained that they had merely carried out their duties as prescribed by law. The 1st notice was sent to the appellant by e-mail pursuant to his request and that they had served the 2nd notice personally out of abundance of caution. The respondents averred that they are not pursuing the appellant for the shooting case of the three men. They wanted to investigate him for a post that he put on his Facebook page on 7 April 2020 of the destitute Indian Family.

[4] It is the appellant's case that the 1st notice and then the 2nd notice issued by the police under s 111 CPC are oppressive and mala fide, and designed to dissuade or prevent him from carrying out his duties as an advocate and solicitor. The appellant referred to the case of Uthayakumar Ponnusamy v. PP , [2005] 7 CLJ 466 (HC), which says that the notice must be issued and served by the same police officer, namely the Investigating Officer and the Court held that the failure to ensure the police officer who served the notice was the same officer who signed it rendered, the applicant's detention under s 111(2) to be declared to be unlawful. Similarly, in the present case the 1st notice and the 2nd notice under s 111 of the by the respondents are null and void and of no effect and therefore ought to be set aside.

Findings Of The High Court

[5] The learned judge