Another trial commences

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Monday, 02 February 2009

Singapore Democrats

Prosecution, or is it persecution, of SDP members and its supporters continues after the Lunar New Year festive lull. This morning the trial of Mr Gandhi Ambalam, Ms Chee Siok Chin, Mr Chong Kai Xiong, Mr John Tan, Mr Charles Tan Teck Wee, and Mr Yap Keng Ho got underway at the Subordinate Courts.

The six are charged with participating in an illegal procession on 16 Sep 07 under the Miscellaneous Offences (Public Order & Nuisance) (Assemblies & Processions) Rules.

The charge was, however, amended at the last minute just before the Lunar New Year to specify that under Rule 2(c) the defendants had participated "in a procession intended to commemorate the first anniversary of the WB-IMF protest held on 16 Sep 06."

The original charge, served on the accused persons on 24 Jun 08, did not mention anything about the WB-IMF protest the previous year. It only accused the group with "participating in a procession in a public place" without a permit at the vicinity of Funan Digital Mall at North Bridge Road.

Today, Ms Chee Siok Chin objected to the way the prosecution had been dealing with the defendants, not only in this case but also in previous trials.

Ms Chee, one of the defendants said: "It has become the habit of the AG's Chambers to wait for a week or less before the trial begins and then serve on us the amended charges. This is not the first time. This has happened in the previous two trials and the AG's Chambers has now done it again."

Ms Chee said since she and her co-defendants were neither legal practitioners nor having legal educational background they would need more time to re-prepare on the amended charge.

DPP John Lu argued that the amended charge is "only minor" and it did not alter much the original charge.

"If its only minor, why did the prosecution take more than six months to come up with the amendment?" Mr Ambalam shot back.

Mr Ambalam repeated the defendants' need for a couple of days to study the amended charge.

District Judge John Ng noted that the amended charge "is different from the original charge on two material aspects" and gave the defendants until Wednesday to prepare their case.

The trial resumes at Subordinate Court 19 on 4 Feb at 9.30am.

Besides this trial, a number of SDP members, their supporters and activists are facing successive trials, mostly involving illegal assemblies and processions. One such trial is the Tak Boleh Tahan protest in front of the Parliament House on 15 Mar 08 organised to highlight the escalating cost of living in Singapore.

CHARGE
(Amended)

You are charged that you, on the 16th day of September 2007 at about 3.40pm, in the vincinity of Funan DigitaLife Mall located at 109 North Bridge Road, Singapore, which is a public place, together with the 5 persons...did participate in a procession intended to commemorate an event, to wit, the “first anniversary of the WB-IMF protest held on 16 September 2006”, which procession you ought reasonably to have known was held without a permit under the Miscellaneous Offences (Public Order & Nuisance) (Assemblies and Processions) Rules, and you have thereby committed an offence punishable under Rule 5 of the said Rules.

Sukhdev Singh, ASP
Investigating Officer
Central Police Division
23 January 2009

Rule 5 of the Miscellaneous Offence (Public Order & Nuisance) (Assemblies & Processions) Rules:-

Any person who participates in any assembly or procession in any public road, public place, or place of public resort shall, if he knows or ought reasonably to have known that the assembly or procession is held without a permit, or in contravention of any term or condition of a permit, be guilty of an offence and should be liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding $1,000.

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Comments (6)

Tue 03 Feb 2009 8:54 PM | Robox

The PAP and it's many minions are up to their connivance again. By shifting the goalpost this time, they hope to convince those watching that any resulting conviction has legitimacy.

No matter.

The law that the defendants are being charged with, albeit amended, is still UNCONSTITUTIONAL!

Tue 03 Feb 2009 6:40 PM | tan

PAP still wayang after all this time? zzzzz.....enough of this shit, it's boring.

Tue 03 Feb 2009 7:14 PM | AnnA - Can Law Be Fickle Minded?

It is a shame to be known by everyone around the world that one of the most serious place in Singapore (respectable? my foot), a place which has determined to ruin 100% of anybody's life (PP vs anyone - PP wins), a place that is one of the busiest 'port' in Singapore for revenues, is so fickle minded is charging SDP. They chose whatever they want to charge as if they are choosing items in supermarket, deciding to change it's brand after standing in queue for payments.

An IO can suggest which charges suits best for his suspect. It depends.. isn't our life f***ed?

Singapore's Subordinate Court is the busiest 'PORT' in South East Asia. It generates revenue every 1 hour on office hours and every 30 seconds after 6pm. You don't believe me? Go to see for yourself especially at 6pm court 26N. They mean business. Very serious in charging. But when it comes to charging SDP, their fickle mindedness shows how weak they are :P So worry that SDP has a say on it and that the judge cannot convict them, so they change the charges? Why change ah? No more issue right?

We are not even given first warning when littering or anything similar (small mistakes means $200, anything bigger is $1K onwards)
KNNCCB PAP!

Tue 03 Feb 2009 8:12 PM | exSINgaPOORean - Don't waste your time!

Don't fall into PAP's trap. They just want you to waste your time and energy by going to court.

I bet all of you are sure to loose in the kangaroo court. If the case becomes to embarassing to the PAP govt. the kangaroo court would aply the "summary judgement".

Why border to prepare any case.

Just pledge guilty but states cleary that your pledging guilty is NOT admitted that you have done wrong but to save your time and tax payers' money. Then go to jail for 10 to 15 days...time to take a good rest and think of new strategies to fight the corrupted PAP regime.

The whole damn Singapore govt and legal system is used to suppress the innocent Singaporeans. You cannot win them as long as LKY is alive.

Spend more time to pray and curse hims death by a painful death. Oh no curse that his wife, daughter and cancer son (two or three of his grandchildren die from car accident) die before him so that he suffers seeing his love ones gone then may the chief devil take him along by this year of 2009.

To this type of evil people you can only curse them die a painful death.

Damn it, the more I read how this ex Japanese spy imprison his fellow law- abiding citizens the more I want to curse his whole family die by million bees stings. Evil and corrupted LEE family go to hell!

Tue 03 Feb 2009 9:05 PM | Tan Tai Wei

The motive for the amendment is obviously to aggravate the charge, and ask for a graver sentencing.

But the law says only that a permit is required for the public gathering, and does not rule on the nature of the "protest" it was for. The discretion as to the objective permissibhle for meeting is left by law to the permitting authority.

Then, is it legal to include in the charge, and thus making it a crime also, the objective of celebrating the anniversary of a previous like offence the defenders intended by their gathering?

Is the zeal of the AG to "uphold" the law blinding him to the extra-legality of the measure he seems to be taking in order to effect a more severe sentencing of the "offenders"?