KUALA LUMPUR (April 18): The High Court on Tuesday (April 18) has upheld Parti Kesejahteraan Demokratik Masyarakat (KDM) chief Datuk Peter Anthony’s conviction for forging a letter of support from the Universiti Malaysia Sabah (UMS) to secure a system maintenance contract in 2014.
The court also upheld his three years jail sentence and RM50,000 fine imposed by the Sessions Court, but granted Peter’s application for a stay of execution.
Judge Datuk Ahmad Bache ruled the Sessions Court judge Azura Alwi did not err in her findings and found that the prosecution had proven the charge beyond reasonable doubt.
“The defence had failed to create doubts to the case. Following this, the High Court is upholding his conviction,” Ahmad said.
The judge also agreed with Azura that a former UMS vice chancellor and two other witnesses who testified are credible witnesses and were not partners in crime.
Ahmad said the letter of support was used to deceive then prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak, who was also the finance minister, and the project was cancelled only after the letter was found to be a forgery.
He added that Azura had evaluated the evidence before her correctly, through the testimonies of the witnesses, prior to arriving at her decision.
According to him, Peter’s defence was just a mere denial and afterthought, when he claimed that he did not come to the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) to meet Najib and his senior private secretary, when there was an official stamp on the letter from the office.
Hence, Ahmad ruled the conviction made by Azura was safe.
Peter unsuccessful in seeking lower sentence as a first-time offender
Peter, a former Parti Warisan Sabah vice-president and former Sabah executive councillor for the infrastructure and development minister, was found guilty by Azura on May 26 last year and was subsequently sentenced to three years of jail and a RM50,000 fine.
He was represented by counsel S Devanandan, who argued that the court should consider reducing the sentence as Peter was a first offender and had contributed a lot to UMS’s development, and there was no money lost when the letter of award issued by the government was revoked.
“In addition, the prosecution did not file a cross-appeal over the sentence,” Devanandan said.
Deputy Public Prosecutor Datuk Wan Shaharuddin Wan Laden asked that the sentence remain, to serve as a deterrent.
While Wan Shaharuddin agreed that there was no money lost, the fact that the forgery had caused Najib and the finance ministry to issue the letter of award before revoking it, shows that the forgery is a serious offence.
“Let this serve as a lesson to society,” he added.
Following this, Ahmad agreed to let the jail sentence and fine remain.
As Devanandan argued for a stay of the sentence, and there was no objection by Wan Shaharuddin, Ahmad also granted the stay of execution of the jail sentence until the politician (Peter) exhausts his final appeal at the Court of Appeal.
Devanandan promised that the notice of appeal will be filed soon, before the 14-day period.