MALAYSIA: APEX COURT COMMUTES EX-SAWMILL WORKER’S DEATH SENTENCE FOR RAPE AND MURDER TO 40 YEARS IN PRISON

October 16, 2024:

The Federal Court in Putrajaya on August 7, 2024 commuted the death sentence of a former sawmill worker to 40 years in prison for killing and raping a nurse nine years ago.
A three-judge panel led by Justice Datuk Harmindar Singh Dhaliwal allowed Mohammad Awari Ahmad’s application to review his death sentence under the Revision of Sentence of Death and Imprisonment for Natural Life (Temporary Jurisdiction of the Federal Court) Act 2023.
The judge also ordered Mohammad Awari, 31, to be given 12 strokes of the cane, and for his prison term to commence from the date of his arrest on March 1, 2015.
In delivering the court’s ruling, Justice Harmindar said although the circumstances of Mohammad Awari’s crime were quite exceptional, the one mitigating factor that saved him from the death penalty was his young age at the time of the offence.
Justice Harmindar, who presided along with Justices Datuk Abu Bakar Jais and Datuk Hanipah Farikullah, ordered Mohammad Awari to serve his 40-year prison term concurrently with the custodial sentence imposed for the rape conviction.
Earlier in the proceedings, Mohammad Awari’s lawyer, Gurbachan Singh, acknowledged the gravity of the crime and the tragic loss of life but argued for the death sentence to be commuted to life imprisonment, emphasising that his client was just 22 years old at the time.
However, deputy public prosecutor Atiqah Abdul Karim @ Husaini objected to the application for review, stressing that it was a brutal murder of the young mother of three, who was also subjected to rape.
She said Mohammad Awari entered the house in the middle of the night while the victim was sleeping with her three children and her husband was not at home.
Atiqah said Mohammad Awari had slashed the victim’s neck, which was witnessed by her five-year-old son. She added that the victim was also robbed and violently raped.
Mohammad Awari was initially found guilty and sentenced to death by the Kota Bharu High Court in Kelantan on Jan 31, 2018, for killing the 25-year-old wife of an auxiliary policeman.
He was also convicted of raping the woman and sentenced to 18 years in jail and 12 strokes of the cane.
He was charged with murdering and raping the woman between 12.20 am and 2 am in a house in Kampung Batu Papan, Gua Musang, Kelantan, on March 1, 2015.
His appeals against both his conviction and death sentence were dismissed by the Court of Appeal on April 11, 2019, and by the Federal Court on Oct 7, 2020.