Five Prison Dept wardens in KK acquitted of inmate’s murder

KOTA KINABALU: Five out of the 10 Prison Department wardens accused for the murder of an inmate in 2019 have been discharged and acquitted.

The five discharged were Barry Jipmon, 34, Mohd Dzulfikri Mohd Safri, 28, Ab Mutalib Talib Abd Rasul, 44, Zerry Maidin, 37, and Shahryll Nazry Wan Sofian, 29.

Another five pleaded guilty to an amended charge of causing death by negligence at the High Court here, Thursday (Oct 26).

The five who pleaded guilty were Farizan Mokri, 45, Mohd Saiful Saidin, 39, Amran Yasik, 29, Tommy Momoh, 40, and Muhammad Fazi Lakui, 36.

High Court Judge Christopher Chin instructed the five who pleaded guilty to pay a RM1,500 fine, or face a month’s jail.

A total of 28 prosecution witnesses were brought in during the course of the trial that started on May 10, 2022.

During mitigation, counsel PJ Pereira told the court that the five who pleaded guilty were the breadwinners of their families, with children and parents to care for.

He said these five were former excellent performing employees and urged for a bond of good behaviour be imposed.

"In the event that this court is not with us, we humbly pray that a fine of below RM2,000 be imposed on our client.

"Any amount of a fine above RM2,000 would result in these accused persons losing their jobs," he said.

Earlier, it was heard that the 10 prison wardens, had, between the second and fourth day of Oct 2019, around 4.10pm, committed murder by causing the death of one Shainal Mukhtar in his prison cell at the Kota Kinabalu Central Prison in Kepayan, near here.