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By Lian Cheng
KUCHING, Sept 15: The High Court here has acquitted two men accused of being involved in the murder of businessman Tang Tung Kuok due to the failure of the prosecution to prove “common intention” following the absence of four other main suspects, who are China nationals.
Both Teng Jing Biau, 32 and Tiong Kim Kai, 41 were charged under Section 302 of the Penal Code, read together with Section 34 of the same code, for the murder of Tang at an unnumbered house at Lorong Dusun, Off Jalan Ong Tiang Swee, Kuching on Jan 12, 2019 at 10.30pm and Jan 15, 2019 at 9am.
According to the facts of the case, Tang, a businessman was kidnapped by five individuals including four Chinese nationals and Tiong, outside his office at Third Mile, Jalan Datuk Tawi Sli, on the night of Jan 12, 2019.
Tang was believed to have been later brought by his kidnappers to an empty house at Jalan Dusun. When Tang’s body was found, his legs were tied with nylon ropes, along with his body and hands.
The first accused Teng was suspected to be the mastermind in the murder for buying the ropes and the murder weapon while the second accused, Tiong, was suspected of assisting in this murder case by helping the China nationals to kidnap Tang and bringing him to the empty house.
In this case where 38 witnesses were called, Kuching High Court Judge Alwi Abdul Wahab made the ruling citing insufficient evidence and am incomplete investigation, especially when both were charged for murder for sharing “common intention” with the four Chinese nationals.
To him, ‘common intention’ meant the meeting of minds and a prearranged plan. Without the presence of the four Chinese nationals, the charge could not be proven, rendering the investigation as “incomplete”.
After the ruling of the case, Voon Lee Shan who represented Tiong told the media at Kuching Court Complex that the arrest of the four China nationals was crucial to unveil the truth of the case.
“The four China men are very, very important (to prove the case). They must be arrested. So the investigation is not completed yet,” said Voon.
He claimed that in the case, Tiong was just a driver who had no clue of what happened inside the house where the crime was committed.
Roger Chin who represented Teng with Michael Kong, agreed with Voon that the prosecution had very weak evidence without the arrest of the four Chinese nationals, following which prosecutors could not prove “common intention” which Tiong and Teng were charged under.
“Because ‘common intention’ talks about the meeting of the minds, prearranged plan. So as they were all charged under ‘common intention’, then our question was that, without the four China nationals, who actually made the plan to kill the deceased? Nobody knows. Who asked who to kill, nobody knows.
“And when was that instruction given? By whom, to kill the deceased? Nobody knows. So because of that, we believed that it left a very material gap in the prosecution case. That is why we are saying that the evidence was actually quite weak to charge these two persons,” said Chin. — DayakDaily
