Raja Azlan Shah FJ:

[1] The appellants were charged with murder under s 302, read with s 34, Penal Code and after a trial extending over 15 days they were convicted on that charge and sentenced to death.

[2] The incident giving rise to this case took place at about 9.00am on 9 April 1974 at the New Market, in the Old Town of Petaling Jaya. However, two days before that date there was an altercation between the deceased and appellant 1 and his brother who kept a pork stall opposite that of deceased, a pork-seller by profession, resulting in deceased assaulting both of them. A police report was lodged by appellant 1. With that background showing the estranged relationship between deceased and appellant 1 it is alleged by the prosecution that the appellants and probably one other made an attack with choppers and saw on the deceased. The appellants were brothers and worked and lived separately, and a point stressed to us by the prosecution and indeed to the trial court was that on that fatal morning they converged at the same time and at the same place and attacked the deceased inflicting multiple deep incised wounds, two of these being head wounds of a serious nature, thus showing that they were acting in concert in pursuance of a pre-arranged plan. The only witness who speak to the occurrence is PW8, the son of the deceased, a student of La Salle Secondary School, then aged 13 years, and 14 years at the date of trial. He was allowed to give evidence on affirmation as the learned judge held that he understood the nature and meaning of the oath. He said that morning he was assisting his father at the stall. Appellant 1 came and challenged his father to a fight. He knew the appellant as he had seen him before that date in the market at his brother's stall. His father did not accept the challenge; the appellant then went away and returned almost immediately with three men (in cross-exarmination he said four men). He identified one of them as appellant 4. He said appellant 1 was armed with a saw and the others were armed with choppers. They slashed his father; PW8 said he saw two blows landed on his father, but could only say one landed on his cheek; the father then ran to the first floor; three of the assailants, one of them being appellant 1, pursued him. He ran out of the market and shouted for help. He then rushed to the first floor. On the way up, he saw the same three men coming downstairs - appellant 1 carrying a saw and the other two carrying choppers.

[3] He found his father lying on the door in a pool of blood. With the help of his aunt, PW9, the deceased was carried downstairs and taken to hospital where he died some 1'bd hours later.

[4] PW9, deceased's elder sister who had a vegetable stall in another area of the market testified that she was attracted by the commotion upstairs and by someone shouting to her that her younger brother was attacked. She rushed upstairs. On the landing which separated the first flight of stairs and the second, she saw four persons coming down the stairs. She identified appellant three who she said she had seen once before that date, as one of the four persons. He was holding a chopper and his clothes were covered with blood. After deceased was sent to hospital, PW9 went to his stall and picked up some money from the floor and stall. She also picked up three choppers - two from the stall and one from the floor. She wrapped them, took them home and later handed them to the police. On the blade of one of the choppers was nine strands of human head hair and two strands of pig hair; on another six strands of human head hair and two strands of pig hair.

[5] PW11, deceased's brother-in-law, a vegetable-seller at the same market, identified appellant 4 who was then going down the stairs. He said when he heard the commotion had spread to the first floor he rushed upstairs. He saw three and four persons going down by the other staircase nearer the pork stalls. They had almost reached the ground flo