Yogesan A/L Krishnan (JA-45A-33-04/2021)

The accused, Yogesan a/l Krishnan, was tried in this Court on one charge of trafficking in a dangerous drug under section 39B(1)(a) of the Dangerous Drugs Act 1952 (“the DDA”), an offence punishable under section 39B(2) of the same Act. The prosecution alleged that on 28.8.2019, at about 10.00 p.m., at the roadside of Jalan Pandan, Kampung Melayu Pandan, in the district of Johor Bahru, in the State of Johor Darul Ta'zim, the accused was found trafficking in the dangerous drug Methamphetamine, of net weight 105.21 grammes.

The original charge sheet lodged at the Magistrates' Court, Johor Bahru (Enc. 1), following the accused's arrest, S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug **Note : Serial number will be used to verify the originality of this document via eFILING portal 2 particularised the drug seized by reference to Johor Jaya Police Report 8140/2019 and recorded an estimated weight of 150.66 grammes, this being the raw weight taken at the point of seizure before the exhibit was subjected to chemical analysis. Upon the drug being analysed, and the exact net weight of the controlled substance therein having been determined, the charge was amended. The First Amended Charge, admitted into evidence and marked as Exhibit P2, was read to the accused, who claimed trial. It reads, verbatim, as follows: “Bahawa kamu bersama-sama pada 28/8/2019, jam lebih kurang 2200hrs, di bertempat tepi Jalan Pandan, Kampung Melayu Pandan di dalam daerah Johor Bahru, dalam Negeri Johor Darul Takzim telah didapati mengedar dadah berbahaya jenis Methamphetamine berat bersih 105.21 gram. Oleh yang demikian, kamu telah melakukan satu kesalahan di bawah seksyen 39B(1)(a) Akta Dadah Berbahaya 1952 dan boleh dihukum di bawah seksyen 39B(2) Akta yang sama.”

The prescribed punishment, as recited on the face of Exhibit P2, is death, or, in the alternative, imprisonment for life, this being the sentencing structure applicable to section 39B(1)(a) of the DDA following the 2017 amendments to that Act. The accused was called upon to plead to the First Amended Charge and entered a plea of not guilty, whereupon the matter proceeded to full trial.

The trial was conducted between 2023 and 2026 before more than one judge. The prosecution's case was heard by YA Dato' Abu Bakar Bin Katar between 14.11.2023 and 15.4.2025. During the proceedings, the accused changed S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug **Note : Serial number will be used to verify the originality of this document via eFILING portal 3 counsel. Following the filing of written submissions by both parties, YA Dato' Abu Bakar Bin Katar ruled on 21.7.2025 that the prosecution had established a prima facie case and called upon the accused to enter his defence.

Following the predecessor judge's retirement, I assumed conduct of the trial. I first presided over the matter on 26.11.2025, before the defence case commenced. The defence evidence was heard on 8.1.2026, 22.1.2026, and 24.2.2026. Written submissions were thereafter filed by both parties, and oral clarification was heard on 23.4.2026. I then reserved judgment after considering the evidence and submissions in their entirety.

This Court delivered its decision orally on 7.5.2026, finding the accused not guilty of the charge and ordering that he be released and discharged, for the reasons recorded in an oral ruling delivered at that time. These written grounds, elaborating upon that oral ruling, are delivered pursuant to this Court's ongoing duty to record its reasons in full.

The prosecution called four witnesses in support of its case: SP1, Corporal 158989 Nik Aslinda binti Nik Ramli, the exhibit storekeeper; SP2, Puan Liew Chyi, the Government chemist; SP3, Inspector G/25756 Sivasankar a/l Mohana Dass, the investigating officer; and SP4, Inspector Mohd Hafiz bin Roslan, the arresting and raiding officer. The S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug **Note : Serial number will be used to verify the originality of this document via eFILING portal 4 prosecution's case, as it emerged from this evidence, is narrated below.

On 28.8.2019, at about 10.00 p.m. (2200 hrs), SP4, together with a party of officers from the Narcotics Criminal Investigation Division, IPD Seri Alam, was conducting a routine patrol styled “Ops Pemutihan/Ops Tapis” in the vicinity of Kampung Melayu Pandan. SP4 testified that no prior surveillance or observation was conducted before the arrest; the team was present in the area, which he described as a known haunt for drug addicts, as part of a routine daily operation. While at the roadside of Jalan Pandan, SP4 saw the accused in what he described as suspicious circumstances, introduced himself as a police officer by producing his authority card, and asked the accused to produce his identity card.

SP4's evidence, as recorded in his witness statement (Exhibit PSSP4) and elaborated upon in oral testimony, was that the accused was asked whether he was carrying anything unlawful and made no reply, remaining silent. SP4 then conducted a physical body search of the accused, witnessed by other members of the raiding party. In the course of that search, SP4 stated that he felt a plastic object in the right front pocket of the maroon knee-length shorts worn by the accused and instructed the accused to remove it. The accused again made no reply and did not comply. SP4 then removed the object himself. It was a bright pink plastic bag bearing the printed words “Terima Kasih/Thank S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug **Note : Serial number will be used to verify the originality of this document via eFILING portal 5 You” (subsequently marked Exhibit P5A), which, upon being opened, was found to contain a single clear plastic packet (subsequently marked Exhibit P5B) containing crystalline material suspected to be Methamphetamine, or its street name, syabu. SP4 thereupon arrested the accused and seized the exhibits.

At about 11.00 p.m. that same night, at the office of the Narcotics Criminal Investigation Division, IPD Seri Alam, SP4 weighed the seized crystalline material using a departmental scale and recorded an estimated weight of 150.66 grammes, this being the weight prior to chemical analysis. At about 12.25 a.m. on 29.8.2019, SP4 informed SP3, the investigating officer, of the arrest and, at about 12.10 a.m., handed over to SP3 the seized exhibits, comprising the maroon shorts (marked “H”), the pink “Terima Kasih/Thank You” bag containing the clear packet of crystalline material (marked “H1” and “H2” respectively), together with the Johor Jaya arrest report (subsequently marked Exhibit P9), a search list (subsequently marked Exhibit P10), and an exhibit hand-over acknowledgment (subsequently marked Exhibit P11).

SP3 assumed conduct of the investigation. On 29.8.2019 at about 3.30 p.m., SP3, accompanied by SP4, attended the scene at Jalan Pandan, Kampung Melayu Pandan, where SP4 pointed out the location of the arrest. SP3 there prepared a rough sketch plan (subsequently marked Exhibit P14) and took six photographs of the scene (subsequently S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug **Note : Serial number will be used to verify the originality of this document via eFILING portal 6 marked Exhibit P13(1-6)). SP3's evidence was that upon receiving the seized crystalline material from SP4, he kept it in his own locked safe, to which only he held the key, in his office, pending its delivery to the chemist.

SP3, who by the time of trial had served as a police officer for approximately fourteen years, of which some four years had been spent as an investigating officer with the Narcotics Criminal Investigation Division at IPD Seri Alam, confirmed that the formal search list prepared by SP4, marked Exhibit P10, itemised exactly three articles recovered from the accused: the maroon knee-length shorts; the bright pink “Terima Kasih/Thank You” plastic bag; and the clear plastic packet, contained within that bag, holding the suspected Methamphetamine. Exhibit P10 records the location of the shorts as being worn by the accused, the pink plastic bag as having been found within the front right pocket of the shorts worn by the accused, and the clear plastic packet as having been found inside the pink plastic bag.

On 29.8.2019 at 2.36 p.m. (1436 hrs), SP3 personally delivered a sealed envelope, marked “SM”, bearing the police seal, to SP2, the Government chemist attached to the Narcotics Section, Jabatan Kimia Malaysia, Johor. SP2 issued an official receipt bearing laboratory number 19-FR-J-05256 (subsequently marked Exhibit P7). SP2's evidence, given both by way of a written witness statement under section 402B of the Criminal Procedure Code (Exhibit PSSP2) and orally, was that upon opening the sealed S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug **Note : Serial number will be used to verify the originality of this document via eFILING portal 7 envelope she found a plastic bag marked “S1” containing a plastic packet marked “S2”, which in turn contained white crystalline material.

SP2 first weighed the gross weight of the wrapping together with its contents, then removed the contents and weighed the empty wrapping, arriving at a net weight, being the difference between the two, of 148.61 grammes for the crystalline material in packet “S2”. SP2 then rendered the material into a homogeneous powder for the purposes of analysis. She conducted the Marquis and Simon colour tests, both of which returned results consistent with the presence of Methamphetamine; she thereafter confirmed the identity of the substance by Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometer (“GCMS”); and she determined the quantity of the controlled substance by Gas Chromatography-Flame Ionization Detector (“GC-FID”), from which analysis she concluded that the crystalline material in packet “S2” contained 105.21 grammes of Methamphetamine.

SP2's findings were recorded in a report issued under section 399 of the Criminal Procedure Code, dated 16.10.2019, bearing laboratory number 19-FR-J-05256 (subsequently marked Exhibit P8). That report records, in terms material to this judgment, that the substance analysed “telah dijadikan serbuk yang homogen semasa dianalisis” (was rendered into a homogeneous powder during analysis), following which the residue of the analysed material was placed by SP2 into a separate plastic packet, S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug **Note : Serial number will be used to verify the originality of this document via eFILING portal 8 supplied by her and marked “LC” together with the laboratory number (subsequently marked Exhibit P5C), and returned, together with her report, to SP3. Methamphetamine is a dangerous drug listed in the First Schedule to the DDA.

The seized exhibits and chemist's report were thereafter returned to SP3, who, on 14.11.2019 at about 10.00 a.m., delivered the seized exhibits for safekeeping to SP1, the exhibit storekeeper at the PDRM Narcotics Exhibit Store, where they were registered at 2.45 p.m. (1445 hrs) under serial number 880/19 in the exhibit registration book (Exhibit P4, being an extract of “Pol 261”). SP1's evidence was that she personally marked the exhibits with the serial number 880/19 in red permanent ink, obtained SP3's signature and official stamp confirming the hand-over, and thereafter placed the exhibits, in her own presence and accompanied by her supervisor, in a locked cabinet within a secure narcotics exhibit vault, access to which was restricted to three named officers. She confirmed that the exhibits remained in that condition, sealed and undisturbed, up to the date of her testimony.

The prosecution accordingly presented a case in which the drug exhibits passed through a documented and, on its face, unbroken chain from the point of seizure by SP4, through investigation by SP3, analysis by SP2, and safekeeping by SP1. SP3's investigation also documented an earlier physical fitting exercise (acu pakai) conducted S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug **Note : Serial number will be used to verify the originality of this document via eFILING portal 9 with the accused wearing the seized maroon shorts, of which six photographs were taken by SP3 himself and marked as Exhibit P15(1-6); those photographs depict the front, back, both sides, and close-up views of the accused wearing the shorts, with the markings made upon them by SP4 and SP3 respectively. SECTION 3: COURT'S ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS AT THE CLOSE OF THE PROSECUTION'S CASE

3.1 The Duty of the Court at the Close of the Prosecution Case [18] Section 180(1) of the Criminal Procedure Code provides that, at the close of the prosecution's case, the court shall consider whether the prosecution has made out a prima facie case against the accused. The meaning of a prima facie case is settled by the Federal Court in Balachandran v PP [2005] 2 MLJ 301: the force of the evidence adduced must be such that, if unrebutted, it is sufficient to induce the court to believe in the existence of the facts stated in the charge, or to consider its existence so probable that a prudent man ought to act upon the supposition that those facts exist or did happen. [19] This is not achieved by an uncritical acceptance of the prosecution's evidence. As the Federal Court held in PP v Mohd Radzi bin Abu Bakar [2006] 1 CLJ 457, a maximum evaluation requires the court to subject the evidence led by the prosecution in its totality to a maximum evaluation, to S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug scrutinise carefully the credibility of each of the prosecution's witnesses, and to take into account all reasonable inferences that may be drawn from that evidence; where the evidence admits of two or more inferences, one of which favours the accused, it is the duty of the court to draw the inference favourable to the accused. [20] It is also trite, as the Court of Appeal explained in Phiri Mailesi (Zambian) v PP [2013] 5 MLJ 780, that the maximum evaluation exercise cannot be conducted in isolation from the accused's own version of events, where that version has been disclosed to the prosecution at the earliest opportunity by way of an Alcontara Notice. Where such notice has been given, an evidential onus falls upon the prosecution, even at its own stage of the case, to investigate and, where it can, disprove that version; this principle, deriving from Alcontara Ambross Anthony v PP [1996] 1 MLRA 47 (Federal Court), is addressed further in Section 6 below, in circumstances where it assumed particular significance following the recall of SP4 during the defence stage. This Court notes, for completeness at this juncture, that the defence had, from the earliest stage of the prosecution case, put to SP4 the suggestion that he had gone to the scene with a man known as “Yuki,” a suggestion SP4 denied.

3.2 Successor Judge: Duty and Approach S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug [21] The prosecution's case in this trial was heard and presided over by the predecessor judge, from the first hearing on 14.11.2023 through to the close of the prosecution's case and his ruling of 21.7.2025. The predecessor judge subsequently retired. I took over conduct of the matter thereafter in the same court and presided over the trial from the defence stage onward. I did not preside over the prosecution's case and had no opportunity to observe SP1, SP2, or SP3 as they gave their evidence, nor did I observe SP4 during the prosecution stage, although SP4 was subsequently recalled to give evidence before me during the defence stage. This circumstance gives rise to the question of what approach this Court should adopt. [22] The governing authority is Norol Rojik Jun v PP [2018] 8 CLJ 186, a decision of the Court of Appeal. In that case, the defence was called on the order of the Court of Appeal after the original trial judge's acquittal on the murder charge had been reversed. A different judge presided over the defence stage. On appeal against conviction, the accused argued, among other things, that the succeeding judge had erred by failing to reopen the question of whether a prima facie case had been established. The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal and held: “It was therefore not open to the succeeding judge to reopen the issue of whether a prima facie case had been established by the prosecution. Nor was it open to us, being a court of co-ordinate jurisdiction, to do so. The trial judge's duty after the order was made by this court was only to consider whether the appellant's explanation, if any, had cast a reasonable S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug doubt in the prosecution case. But of course in doing so, the learned judge was bound by s. 182A(1) of the Criminal Procedure Code ('the CPC') to consider all the evidence adduced before the court, which necessarily includes evidence adduced by the prosecution at its stage of the case.” [23] The Court of Appeal further held, at paragraph 44 of Norol Rojik: “At the conclusion of the trial, what s. 182A(1) of the CPC requires is for the court to consider all the evidence in determining whether the case had been proved beyond reasonable doubt. This does not mean however that the court must decide all over again whether a prima facie case had been established by the prosecution. That is a requirement of s. 180(1) of the CPC at the close of the prosecution case and not a requirement of s. 182A(1) at the close of the defence case.” [24] This Court adopts and applies this guidance, consistent with the approach I have taken in other matters where I have succeeded a predecessor judge after the close of the prosecution case. The calling of the accused's defence in this matter was the order of the predecessor judge. This Court treats that order as having been made by this Court itself. It is not open to this Court to revisit whether the prosecution's evidence was sufficient to establish a prima facie case; that question was concluded on 21.7.2025 and does not fall to be decided again. Any ground upon which the accused seeks an acquittal must accordingly be rooted in what the defence evidence has raised, considered together with the whole of the evidence under section 182A(1), and not in a retrospective challenge to the sufficiency of the prosecution's case as it stood at the close of the prosecution's case. S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug [25] What follows in the remainder of this section is not, therefore, a reconsideration of the predecessor judge's ruling, still less an exercise of any power to disturb it. It is a narration, for the completeness of these grounds and for the assistance of any court that may later be seised of this matter, of the evidentiary foundation upon which that ruling rests, so as to show how the ruling tallies with and is borne out by the evidence adduced during the prosecution's case. Where challenges to the prosecution witnesses were raised in cross-examination at the prosecution stage, those challenges and the evidence bearing on them are also addressed here.

3.3 The Predecessor Judge's Ruling [26] Having considered, by his own express account, the evidence adduced during the prosecution's case by way of maximum evaluation, together with the parties' written submissions, the predecessor judge delivered his ruling on 21.7.2025 in the following terms: “(a) Pendakwaan berjaya membuktikan pemilikan keatas dadah berbahaya secara terus yang menjadi teras Pertuduhan Pindaan Pertama (P2) Berbahaya 1952 diaktifkan. S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug [27] The accused was accordingly called upon to enter his defence on the First Amended Charge (P2). The three strands of this ruling are addressed below by reference to the three elements of the offence under section 39B(1)(a) of the DDA.

3.4 First Element: Nature of the Drug [28] SP2's evidence, given both in her written statement under section 402B of the Criminal Procedure Code and in oral testimony, was that the substance seized from the accused's person was analysed by the Marquis and Simon colour tests, confirmed by GCMS, and quantified by GC-FID, and was found to be Methamphetamine of net weight 105.21 grammes, a drug listed in the First Schedule to the DDA. As held by the trilogy of the Supreme Court cases of Munusamy Vengadasalam v PP [1987] 1 MLJ 492, PP v Lam San [1991] 3 MLJ 426 and Khoo Hi Chiang v PP [1994] 1 MLJ 265, as cited in Balachandran v PP, the evidence of a Government chemist on the analysis of dangerous drugs may ordinarily be accepted at face value, without the necessity of the chemist descending into the granular detail of each step taken in the laboratory, unless that evidence is inherently incredible or is met with rebuttal expert evidence, neither of which occurred here. The evidence supports the predecessor judge's finding on this element.

3.5 Second Element: Possession [29] As explained in Chan Pean Leon v PP [1956] 1 LNS 17 (High Court), in reality there are two separate questions involved: first, whether the accused was in possession, and second, whether he had knowledge of the nature of the thing possessed. "Possession" itself as regards the criminal law comprises both a physical element and a mental element (an intention to deal with the thing, or animus possidendi); a moveable thing is said to be in the possession of a person when he is so situated with respect to it that he has the power to deal with it as owner to the exclusion of all other persons, and when the circumstances are such that he may be presumed to intend to do so in case of need. [30] The prosecution's case on this element rested entirely on the direct evidence of SP4, who testified that he personally recovered Exhibit P5A, the pink “Terima Kasih/Thank You” bag containing the crystalline material, from the right front pocket of the maroon shorts worn by the accused at the time of his arrest. This evidence, if accepted, establishes direct, and not merely presumed, possession; it was on this basis, and not on the strength of the statutory presumption of possession under section 37(d) of the DDA, that the case for calling upon the accused to answer proceeded, a distinction of some importance which this Court returns to in Section 6. S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug [31] On the mental element of possession, SP4's further evidence was that the accused made no reply when asked whether he was carrying anything unlawful, and made no reply and did not comply when instructed to remove the object from his pocket. As was held in PP v Badrulsham bin Baharom [1988] 2 MLJ 585 (High Court), possession cannot be established in law without proof that the accused had knowledge of the thing found in his possession; and, as explained in PP v Reza Mohd Shah bin Ahmad Shah [2002] 4 MLJ 13 (High Court), a court is not confined to direct evidence of knowledge but may draw reasonable inferences from the surrounding circumstances. On the prosecution's account, the accused's silence and passivity when confronted was capable of supporting the inference that he was aware of the presence and nature of the item in his pocket, there being, at that stage of the case, no competing explanation before the court. The evidence supports the predecessor judge's finding on this element.

3.6 Third Element: Trafficking [32] The prosecution did not seek to prove an act of trafficking as defined in section 2 of the DDA by direct evidence; instead, it relied on the statutory presumption of trafficking under section 37(da)(xvi) of the DDA, which arises where an accused is found in possession of Methamphetamine exceeding 50 grammes. As the Federal Court explained in PP v Denish Madhavan [2009] 2 MLJ 194, once possession and knowledge have been proved, the presumption of S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug trafficking under section 37(da) may be invoked in full force, without any further requirement that the prosecution prove an overt act of trafficking. The weight of Methamphetamine found on the prosecution's case, 105.21 grammes, being more than double the statutory threshold, was, once the underlying possession is taken as proved, sufficient to activate the presumption. The evidence supports the predecessor judge's finding on this element.

3.7 Matters Raised by the Defence at the Prosecution Stage [33] Two specific challenges to the prosecution's witnesses were raised by the defence in cross-examination and in its written submissions at the close of the prosecution case. Consistently with the approach set out at paragraph [25] above, they are recorded here for completeness, as matters going to the evidentiary foundation of the predecessor judge's ruling, and not as an occasion for this Court to reconsider that ruling. [34] The first concerned Exhibit P15, the six photographs of the investigative acu pakai taken by SP3. SP4 had testified that, in the course of his physical search of the accused, he felt, and that there was visible, a bulge (benjolan) on the outside of the pocket of the shorts. When shown Exhibit P15 in cross-examination, SP4 accepted that no such bulge was visible in any of the six photographs. The defence submitted that this contradiction between SP4's oral evidence and the photographic record undermined his credibility even at that S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug early stage. A bulge felt by touch during a physical search is not necessarily one that would appear as visually obvious in a subsequently taken photograph, depending on the angle, lighting, and the passage of time between the search and the photograph; the point was, on the record, capable of an innocent explanation. It is, in any event, a matter properly considered together with the further and more serious credibility difficulties that emerged at the defence stage, addressed in Section 6.2 below. [35] The second concerned the chemist's handling of the exhibit during analysis. The defence submitted that the prosecution had failed to establish how the exhibit was secured during breaks in SP2's analysis, such that a gap existed in the chain of continuity while the material was open in the laboratory, and that this rendered SP2's analysis unsatisfactory. As explained in Balachandran, the evidence of a Government chemist may be accepted at face value unless it is inherently incredible or is challenged by rebuttal expert evidence; no rebuttal chemist was called by the defence, and SP2's evidence as to her methodology, the tests she conducted, and her findings was not shown to be inherently incredible. The absence of evidence as to precisely how the exhibit was safeguarded during meal or rest breaks in the laboratory is recorded, consistent with the observation of the Supreme Court in Pang Chee Meng v PP [1992] 1 MLJ 137 that an accused ought not to be penalised for a lack of ingenuity in police investigations so as to be deprived of the benefit of a genuine doubt. S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug [36] It bears emphasis, for the purposes of what follows in Section 6, that the case the accused was called upon to answer was, on this analysis, a case of direct physical possession founded on the singular testimony of SP4, and not a case built upon the operation of statutory presumption alone. The significance of that distinction lies in this: whatever might be said of the section 37(da) presumption of trafficking, that presumption is itself parasitic upon a prior and independent finding of possession; it does not arise, and cannot be relied upon, unless and until possession is first established. The soundness of the entire prosecution case therefore rested, from the outset, upon the reliability of a single witness's account of a single, unwitnessed physical act, namely the removal of a package from the accused's pocket. It is against that structural feature of the prosecution's case that the evidence subsequently called by the defence, and in particular the recall of SP4 himself, must be assessed. SECTION 4: THE PRIMA FACIE RULING [37] For the reasons recorded in Section 3 above, the prosecution had, at the close of its case, established a prima facie case on all three elements of the charge under section 39B(1)(a) of the DDA: that the substance seized was a dangerous drug within the First Schedule to the DDA; that the accused was in direct physical possession of that drug, with knowledge of its presence and nature; and that, possession having been so established, the statutory S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug presumption of trafficking under section 37(da) of the DDA was thereby activated in respect of a net weight of 105.21 grammes of Methamphetamine, well in excess of the 50- gramme statutory threshold. [38] The accused was accordingly called upon, in accordance with section 180(3) of the Criminal Procedure Code, to enter upon his defence. He was informed of the three options available to him, namely to give evidence on oath from the witness box, to make an unsworn statement from the dock, or to remain silent, and, having elected to give evidence on oath, the trial proceeded to the defence stage. SECTION 5: THE DEFENCE'S NARRATIVE [39] The defence called two witnesses: SD1, the accused himself, who gave evidence on oath on 8.1.2026 and 22.1.2026; and SD2, Muhammad Zulkifli bin Ishak, who gave evidence on oath on 24.2.2026. In addition, and as elaborated below, the defence successfully applied to recall SP4 pursuant to section 138 of the Evidence Act 1950 and section 425 of the Criminal Procedure Code, and SP4 was accordingly recalled and further examined on 24.2.2026. [40] SD1's evidence, in material summary, was as follows. The accused, aged 30 at the time he gave evidence, testified in the Tamil language through an interpreter, without a written witness statement, from custody at the Penjara Koreksional Johor Bahru. He testified that, before his arrest, he had S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug worked for approximately one and a half years as a site supervisor in the construction industry, based at a project at Sutera Mall, Johor Bahru. On the night in question, the accused testified that he went to an area near a bus stop close to Jalan Pandan, Kampung Melayu Pandan, for the specific purpose of meeting a Malay male acquaintance whom he knew as “Yuki,” whom he had known for three to four months, in order to collect drugs to give to his workers. [41] This Court records, for the sake of factual completeness, a minor discrepancy in the accused's evidence during his initial testimony as to the precise date of his arrest. The accused initially testified that he was arrested on 27.8.2019 at about 9.00 p.m., explaining that he recalled the date because it coincided with the birthday of a friend of his sister; however, during his continued examination-in-chief on 22.1.2026, he corrected his testimony and confirmed that the date of his arrest was in fact 28.8.2019. This initial discrepancy was not pressed by the prosecution as a matter of significance in its final submissions, and this Court does not treat it as such: a one-day discrepancy in an accused's initial recollection of a specific calendar date, given from memory some six years after the event and subsequently corrected, does not, without more, undermine the substance of his account of what occurred at the scene, particularly where the time, location, and sequence of events he described were not otherwise placed in doubt. S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug [42] On the substance of that account, the accused testified that Yuki had already arrived, in a maroon (actually red as testified by SD2) Suzuki Swift motor car, by the time the accused reached the location. The accused arrived at the location on a motorcycle carrying three mobile telephones, his motorcycle key, and his identity card. He approached the vehicle, going to the driver's side. Yuki, whom the accused identified as the person who wound down the rear window of the vehicle, passed a red plastic bag to him through that window. Within about one minute of receiving the item, the accused was apprehended by the driver of the vehicle, who gripped his hand. The accused's evidence was consistent and repeated under cross-examination that the bag he received was never placed inside his pocket, and that the events he described occurred in a very short space of time, in the region of one minute, between receipt of the item and his arrest. [43] The accused further testified that he had, from an early stage, informed his counsel of this version of events, namely that a man known as “Yuki” was involved in handing him the item at the scene; this version formed the basis of the Alcontara Notice given to the prosecution at the earliest opportunity, notably including a specific question put to SP4 during the prosecution case, on 7.3.2025, in the following terms: “Saya cadangkan tuan, tuan telah pergi ke tempat tersebut dengan seorang lelaki bernama Yuki yang bukan seorang anggota polis?”, to which SP4 answered “Tidak, tiada.” The accused's account of the three mobile S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug telephones he was carrying was that they had been taken from him and discarded from the moving vehicle; this detail, though raised comparatively late in the proceedings, was, on the accused's evidence, put to the investigating officer by his counsel. [44] On 22.1.2026, at the request of the defence, this Court permitted an in-court physical demonstration, styled an “acu pakai,” in which the accused, wearing the same maroon shorts he wore on the night of his arrest, was asked to attempt to place the drug exhibits into the right front pocket of those shorts. The defence's stated basis for seeking the demonstration was that it had, from the earliest stage of the trial, taken the position that the original packaging containing the drugs could not physically have fit within that pocket, given that the accused's pockets were, on his account, already occupied by three mobile telephones and a motorcycle key at the time of his arrest. This Court's earlier observation on this point, as recorded in the oral grounds delivered on 7.5.2026, was made without the benefit of reviewing the video recording of the demonstration. Having since reviewed that recording, this Court records that Exhibit P5C, the container of residual drug material returned by the chemist following her analysis, did in fact fit within the pocket in question. [45] Under cross-examination during the demonstration, the accused was asked to hold up Exhibit P5C together with Exhibit P5B, the original inner packet, and agreed that P5C S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug was the larger of the two. When first asked whether the residual material, if placed back into the smaller original packet, might not fit, the accused answered, on two occasions, that he was not sure. He was then asked, by reference to Exhibit P12 (Gambar 3), whether the drug contents depicted in that photograph, in their original form prior to chemical analysis, would fit within the smaller plastic packet shown; he agreed, and further agreed that there was a difference in shape and colour between Exhibit P5C, as analysed, and the original contents depicted in that photograph. Following a short recess, upon the resumption of proceedings, the prosecution put to the accused that the demonstration had shown Exhibit P5C, being the larger item, had fit within his pocket; the accused agreed. The prosecution then put to him that Exhibit P5A, the outer pink plastic bag containing Exhibit P5B, had accordingly fit within his pocket at the time of the incident; the accused agreed. [46] The defence maintained, in response, that these concessions established only that the exhibits, in their present form, could physically be made to fit within the pocket during a demonstration conducted in court more than six years after the event, and did not establish that the original drugs were in fact in the accused's pocket on the night of his arrest. This Court records that submission, and returns to the significance of the concessions made during the demonstration in Section 6.6 below. S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug [47] SD2's evidence, given from Penjara Kluang where he was detained on an unrelated matter, and where he is known by the nickname “Juki,” was as follows. He confirmed that he had been arrested in Johor Bahru in 2019, and that his own arrest is recorded in Masai Police Report 4112/2019, marked Exhibit D18. Although Exhibit D18 records his place of arrest as the roadside of Jalan Masai Utama 2, SD2's evidence was that he was in fact arrested inside a hotel, namely Hotel Masai, at about 6.00 p.m., some four hours before the accused's own arrest. He was thereafter driven, in his own motor car, a red Suzuki Swift, to the Pandan area, seated in the middle of the rear seat, flanked on either side by police officers, with two further officers in front, one of whom drove the vehicle. [48] SD2 further testified that, upon reaching Pandan, the police took his mobile telephone and made a call. Some time later, a man arrived on a motorcycle and stopped at the rear window of the vehicle in which SD2 was seated. Although he could not remember the man's name, SD2 spontaneously pointed toward the dock and identified that man as the accused. His evidence was that this man passed something through the rear window, and that “masa bagi barang tu, polis terus grip tangan dia, tangkap dia” (at the moment the item was handed over, the police immediately gripped his hand and arrested him). SD2 confirmed that Exhibit D18 described the item found with him as “satu plastik merah jambu cerah bertulisan 'Terima Kasih'“ (a bright pink plastic bag bearing the words “Terima S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug Kasih”), and, shown Exhibit P12, identified photograph 2 as depicting that plastic bag. [49] Under cross-examination, SD2 accepted that he had been convicted in a lower court in connection with his own arrest and had served a term of imprisonment of approximately five months. He accepted that his recollection of certain details of the night, some seven years distant from the date of his testimony, was imperfect. On the specific question of the mechanics of the exchange at the rear window, SD2's evidence, that the man who arrived on the motorcycle “bagi barang” (gave the item), was put by the prosecution as an account in which the accused, rather than Zulkifli, was the one who handed over the item, a characterisation addressed in Section 6 below. SD2 also stated, when asked, that he did not know who the person nicknamed “Yuki” was. This Court notes, however, that SD2 himself confirmed his own nickname to be “Juki,” a name phonetically similar to “Yuki.” Rather than weakening the defence account, this phonetic alignment tends to corroborate SD1's evidence that the man he went to meet that night was known to him by a name sounding like “Yuki”: the two names, on the evidence, describe the same man. [50] The defence's application to recall SP4 was made under section 138 of the Evidence Act 1950 and section 425 of the Criminal Procedure Code, on the footing that the defence had, after taking detailed instructions from the accused, discovered the existence of a separate arrest, that S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug of Zulkifli, carried out on the same night by the same officer, SP4, involving an item of near-identical description. Defence counsel informed the Court that the connection between the nickname “Yuki” and the name Muhammad Zulkifli bin Ishak had only become known to the defence shortly before the application was made, following correspondence with the Registrar's office; a letter from counsel requesting relevant documents was tendered and marked Exhibit D17, the Registrar's response was tendered and marked Exhibit D18, and the court registration list confirming both the accused's and Zulkifli's cases, was tendered and marked Exhibit D16. Counsel submitted, relying on Phon Nam v PP [1991] 2 MLJ 550 (Supreme Court), that the application was not an impermissible attempt at “emergency repairs” to a failing defence case but a legitimate application made in the interests of justice, once the relevant connection had genuinely come to light. [51] The application was resisted by the prosecution on the footing that it amounted to a second attempt to explore matters that could and should have been raised at the prosecution stage; the prosecution indicated that it had no objection to Zulkifli himself being called as a witness, but objected to SP4 being recalled. This Court, having heard both parties, allowed the application, on the ground that there existed a striking similarity between the description of the item seized from Zulkifli, as it appeared in the police report concerning his arrest, and the description of the item seized in the present case, in particular as to the colour of S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug the plastic and the wording printed upon it, namely “Terima Kasih.” This Court directed that any questions to SP4 upon recall be confined to matters relevant to that similarity, and observed that Zulkifli himself was the person best placed to explain what had in fact occurred, and that the defence should accordingly make efforts to locate and call him, which it did. [52] SP4 was accordingly recalled and examined by defence counsel on 24.2.2026. He confirmed that Exhibit D18 was his own report, that it recorded his arrest of Muhammad Zulkifli bin Ishak on 28.8.2019 at about 6.00 p.m., and that the item seized from Zulkifli was described in that report as “satu plastik berwarna merah jambu cerah bertulisan 'Terima Kasih'.” He confirmed that the Masai report, Exhibit D18, was completed at about 11.21 p.m. that night, and that the Johor Jaya report concerning the accused's arrest, Exhibit P9, was completed shortly thereafter, at about 12.15 a.m. When first asked whether the two reports described the same type of plastic bag, SP4 answered that he did not agree that they did. When questioned further by the prosecution, he maintained that position, explaining the distinction that the Masai report described the plastic as bearing the words “Terima Kasih,” whereas the Johor Jaya report described it as bearing the words “Terima Kasih / Thank You.” SP4 maintained, throughout his recalled evidence, that Zulkifli had not been present at the scene of the accused's arrest, and that, after arresting Zulkifli at about 6.00 p.m., he had returned Zulkifli to the police station S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug before proceeding, separately, to arrest the accused at about 10.00 p.m. The prosecution did, following the recall, cross-examine SP4 on this evidence to clarify the differences in the bag descriptions and the timing of the reports, but it did not call any further witness to explain or rebut what had emerged. SECTION 6: ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS AT THE CLOSE OF

6.1 The Governing Legal Standard [53] This Court draws a distinction, at the outset of this section, between the basis on which it has approached Section 3 above and the basis on which it approaches this section. In Section 3, this Court was reviewing a ruling made by a predecessor judge on evidence that predecessor alone had heard; its role there was supervisory, asking whether the record supported the ruling made. The whole of the defence case, by contrast, including the evidence of SD1 and SD2, the recall of SP4, and the physical demonstration of 22.1.2026, was heard, observed, and conducted by this Court directly. The findings that follow in this section are accordingly this Court's own primary findings of fact, made on the strength of this Court's own observation of the witnesses and its own conduct of the demonstration, and not a second-hand review of another judge's assessment. S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug [54] Section 182A of the Criminal Procedure Code provides that, at the conclusion of the trial, the court shall consider all the evidence adduced before it and shall decide whether the prosecution has proved its case beyond reasonable doubt. If the court so finds, it shall convict the accused; if not, it shall record an order of acquittal. As the Federal Court explained in Balachandran v PP, proof beyond reasonable doubt at this stage involves two distinct aspects: the legal burden, which lies throughout on the prosecution to prove its case beyond reasonable doubt, and the evidential burden, which lies on the accused to raise a reasonable doubt; both burdens can only be fully discharged at the end of the whole case, once the defence has closed. [55] The test to be applied to the defence evidence is that established in Mat v PP [1963] 1 MLJ 263 (High Court) and elaborated in Mohamad Radhi bin Yaakob v PP [1991] 3 MLJ 169 (Supreme Court). As Mohamed Azmi SCJ explained in the latter case, to earn an acquittal, the court need not be convinced of the truth of the defence version; it is sufficient that the defence version raises a reasonable doubt as to the guilt of the accused. It is not wrong for a court to convict where it positively disbelieves the defence account and that account fails to raise any reasonable doubt; but a court errs in law if it convicts on the footing that the defence account is disbelieved without going on to ask the further, and decisive, question, namely whether that account, even if not accepted as true, nonetheless raises a reasonable doubt as to guilt. This formulation was S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug reaffirmed by the Federal Court in Gunalan a/l Ramachandran v PP [2006] 2 MLJ 197, where it was held that the court needs only to decide, at the close of the defence case, whether the defence has succeeded in raising a reasonable doubt on the prosecution case; if so, the accused is, without more, entitled to an acquittal, the burden of proof never shifting from the prosecution save in special circumstances. The Court of Appeal in Chan Chor Suh v PP [2003] 1 MLRA 1 likewise emphasised that a trial judge must carefully consider whether the defence put forward is capable of raising a reasonable doubt in the prosecution's case, considering all the evidence adduced in its support. [56] The prosecution, for its part, submits, relying on PP v Mohd Yahya Mat Sahri & Anor [2016] 4 CLJ 227 (Court of Appeal) (which in turn applies the observations of Lord Denning MR in Miller v Minister of Pensions [1947] 2 All ER 372), that proof beyond reasonable doubt does not mean proof beyond the shadow of a doubt, and that a remote or fanciful possibility in the accused's favour does not prevent proof beyond reasonable doubt from being established. This Court accepts that statement of principle without reservation. The question that follows, addressed throughout the remainder of this section, is whether the matters raised by the defence in this case amount to no more than a remote or fanciful possibility, or whether they constitute a real and substantial doubt of the kind that principle does not permit a court to disregard. S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug [57] A further, and in this case critical, refinement of the applicable standard was identified in Mohamad Radhi. Where the prosecution's case rests in part on a statutory presumption, such as the presumption of trafficking under section 37(da) of the DDA, the question whether the defence has rebutted that presumption on a balance of probabilities is a distinct inquiry from the question whether the defence has raised a reasonable doubt as to the underlying facts said to give rise to the presumption in the first place. The two inquiries must not be conflated. In the present case, as explained in Section 3 above, the prima facie case was built upon a finding of direct possession, established by the singular evidence of SP4 that he personally recovered the drug from the accused's pocket; it was only once that direct finding was made that the presumption of trafficking under section 37(da) came into play. It follows, as a matter of logical and legal structure, that if the defence evidence raises a reasonable doubt as to whether the accused was ever in possession of the drug at all, the presumption of trafficking, being parasitic upon a prior finding of possession, does not properly arise, and the question of its rebuttal on a balance of probabilities does not fall to be considered. A presumption that has not properly arisen cannot be the subject of a balance-of-probabilities rebuttal; the anterior question is one of reasonable doubt on the primary fact of possession itself. S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug [58] It is with that framework in mind that this Court turns to consider whether the totality of the evidence, including the evidence called at the defence stage, leaves the prosecution's case proved beyond reasonable doubt.

6.2 SP4's Credibility Is Substantially Undermined [59] The entirety of the prosecution's case on physical possession rests upon the evidence of a single witness, SP4. Although SP4 testified that the physical search was witnessed by other members of the raiding party, no other prosecution witness was called to corroborate the moment at which the drug is said to have been recovered from the accused's pocket. The reliability of that singular account is accordingly of central importance. [60] SP4's credibility was seriously undermined in two related respects. First, at the prosecution stage, when it was expressly put to him, by way of an Alcontara Notice question on 7.3.2025, that he had gone to the scene together with a man known as “Yuki” who was not a police officer, SP4 denied it. His recalled evidence on 24.2.2026 disclosed that this denial was, at the very least, seriously incomplete: SP4 had, on the same night as the accused's arrest, personally arrested a man, Zulkifli, who is known by the closely related nickname “Juki.” Although SP4 maintained upon recall that Zulkifli was not present at the scene of the accused's arrest, Zulkifli himself gave sworn evidence that he was indeed present. S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug [61] Second, when confronted on recall with his own contemporaneous written report of that other arrest, Exhibit D18, alongside his report of the accused's arrest, Exhibit P9, SP4 denied that they described the same type of item. He maintained this position even when questioned by the prosecution, attempting to distinguish the two by pointing out that the Masai report (D18) stated “Terima Kasih,”

6.3 The Contradiction Between the accused and SD2 on the Mechanics of the Handover Is Not Fatal to the Defence [63] The prosecution submitted, both in its final written submissions and orally, that the defence case is fatally undermined by the direct contradiction between the accused's account, that Zulkifli handed the plastic bag to him through the rear window, and SD2's account, in which SD2 described the man who arrived at the window, whom he identified as the accused, as the one who “bagi barang” (gave the item). The prosecution says this is not a peripheral inconsistency but a contradiction on the very identity of who supplied whom, such that the two accounts cannot both be true and the defence version as a whole ought to be rejected. [64] This Court has considered that submission carefully. The submission's premise is that the two accounts must first be reconciled, or one wholly preferred over the other, before either can be of any use to the defence. That is not the correct approach. SD2's evidence need not match the accused's account of the handover in every particular to be of value to the defence. What matters is that SD2's evidence, taken at its core, independently raises a reasonable doubt as to the truth of SP4's account that the accused was arrested alone that night, with the drugs found on his person, and with no one else present at the scene. SD2 was not a party orchestrating the transaction; he was, on the unchallenged parts of his own evidence, a man S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug already under arrest at the time, seated in the rear of a vehicle at night, flanked by police officers, in circumstances not of his choosing, and his account of the precise mechanics of what occurred at the window should be weighed with that context in mind. The disagreement between the accused and SD2 on those mechanics does not touch the more fundamental point: SD2's evidence, accepted even in its broad outline, places him, his vehicle, and a second person at the scene of the accused's arrest, in direct contradiction of SP4's account that no such person or vehicle was present. [65] More fundamentally, the correct application of Mohamad Radhi requires this Court to ask not which of the two accounts, the accused's or SD2's, is to be preferred on the single disputed point of the direction of the handover, but whether, notwithstanding that disagreement, the evidence as a whole leaves the prosecution's case in a state of reasonable doubt. On that inquiry, what is striking is not the parties' disagreement but the extent of their independent agreement on every other material particular. Both the accused and SD2, giving evidence separately, with no suggestion of collusion put to either of them, described: the presence of a maroon or red Suzuki Swift at the scene; SD2's presence in that vehicle; the accused's arrival at the scene by motorcycle; an exchange of some kind occurring at the vehicle's rear window; and the accused's immediate arrest thereafter. SP4's account, by contrast, is that Zulkifli was not present at the scene at all, having already been S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug returned to the police station hours earlier. On the central question of whether Zulkifli and his vehicle were at the scene of the accused's arrest, the evidence of the accused and SD2, two witnesses with no evident common motive and each independently placing the other at the scene, jointly and consistently contradicts the account given by SP4. That joint contradiction is not erased by the parties' disagreement over the finer mechanics of who physically passed the item to whom in the course of a fast-moving arrest that both agree occurred within about one minute.

6.4 SD2's Evidence Is Reliable in Its Core Notwithstanding Peripheral Memory Gaps [66] The prosecution further submits that SD2's evidence is unreliable in its entirety, pointing to his admitted memory gaps, his own conviction arising from the Masai arrest, and his stated inability to identify who “Yuki” was. This Court accepts that SD2's evidence must be approached with appropriate caution: he was, at the time he gave evidence, a serving prisoner recounting events from seven years earlier, without the assistance of any contemporaneous statement of his own. Some imprecision of recollection in those circumstances is unremarkable and does not, without more, render a witness's evidence valueless. [67] What matters is whether the core of SD2's account, tested under cross-examination, held firm. It did. SD2 confirmed, and was not shaken on, the following: that he was arrested S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug in Johor Bahru in 2019; that Exhibit D18, his own arrest report, described a bright pink plastic bag bearing the words “Terima Kasih”; that he was taken, following his arrest, to the Pandan area in his own red Suzuki Swift, driven by police officers; that he was seated in the rear of that vehicle, flanked by officers; that a man arrived by motorcycle, was involved in an exchange with him or through the vehicle's window, and was thereupon arrested, a man he identified in court as the accused; and that he himself was known by the nickname “Juki,” phonetically similar to the name “Yuki” by which the accused knew him. These are not minor or incidental details; they go to the very heart of the defence case, namely that the accused was not alone at the time of his arrest and that a second, connected arrest, involving an identically described item, had occurred earlier that same evening. The prosecution cannot, on the one hand, characterise SD2's evidence as too unreliable to be of any assistance to the defence, while, on the other hand, relying upon aspects of that same evidence, such as SD2's acknowledgment that the drugs were ultimately found with the accused, to support its own case. SD2's evidence must be weighed as a whole, and, so weighed, its consistent core corroborates, rather than undermines, the defence account of what occurred at the scene.

6.5 The Identical Packaging Across Two Same-Night Arrests by the Same Officer Remains Unexplained S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug [68] A feature of this case which this Court considers to be of particular significance is the following: Zulkifli was arrested by SP4 at about 6.00 p.m. on 28.8.2019, with an item described in SP4's own report, Exhibit D18, as a bright pink plastic bag bearing the words “Terima Kasih”. Some four hours later, at about 10.00 p.m. that same night, the same officer, SP4, arrested the accused, and recorded, in his own report, Exhibit P9, the seizure of a bright pink plastic bag bearing the words “Terima Kasih/Thank You”. SD2, shown Exhibit P12, identified photograph 2 as depicting the item found with him; that photograph depicts a bag bearing both the Malay and English wording. The descriptions in the two reports, each authored by SP4, converge on an item of strikingly similar, if not identical, appearance. [69] The prosecution called no evidence to explain this coincidence. It did not produce the record of the Magistrates' Court proceedings arising from Zulkifli's own case, notwithstanding that Exhibit D16, a court registration document listing both names, was before the Court. It did not call any witness to address whether packaging of this precise description was, as a matter of routine, commonly used or separately available in the area, such that the coincidence might have an innocent explanation unconnected to the events at Pandan that night. Where the prosecution's own evidence discloses so striking a coincidence between two arrests, effected by the same officer, on the same night, and where the prosecution offers no evidence at all to account for it, the resulting gap in the S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug evidence, consistent with the principle applied in PP v Mohd Zurizal bin Saad [2021] MLJU 318 (High Court), must be resolved in favour of the accused.

6.6 The Acu Pakai Demonstration Retains Genuine Probative Value [70] The defence's original basis for seeking the demonstration was that it was physically impossible, or close to it, for the drugs as packaged to have fit within the pocket of the accused's shorts. That specific proposition was tested and did not survive the test. The accused agreed, under cross-examination, that Exhibit P5C fit within the pocket; he agreed that Exhibit P5A, containing Exhibit P5B, would accordingly have fit within the pocket at the time of the incident; and he agreed that the original drug contents, as depicted in Exhibit P12, would fit within the smaller of the two containers shown to him. This Court accepts that these concessions dispose of the defence's submission that the physical dimensions of the drug packaging made it impossible, or even improbable, for the drugs to have been carried in the pocket as SP4 described. That submission is not available to the defence, and this Court gives it no weight. [71] The defence submitted, in answer, that a demonstration of physical capacity conducted more than six years after the event does not establish what was actually in the accused's pocket on the night in question. This Court accepts that S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug observation as far as it goes: capacity to hold an item is not proof that the item was held. But it does not restore the defence's original submission, which asserted a physical impossibility that the evidence has since disproved. This Court accordingly treats the acu pakai demonstration as resolved against the defence on the narrow question of physical capacity, and places no reliance on it, in either direction, in reaching the findings that follow. The doubt found in this judgment rests instead on the matters addressed in Sections 6.2 to 6.5 above and 6.7 to 6.13 below, which concern not whether the pocket could physically have held the drugs, but whether the accused was the person from whom the drugs were in fact recovered at all.

6.7 The Alcontara Notice: Timeliness, Burden, and the Prosecution's Silence [72] As explained in Section 3 above, and as established in Alcontara Ambross Anthony v PP and applied in Phiri Mailesi (Zambian) v PP, where an accused discloses his version of events to the prosecution at the earliest opportunity, an onus falls upon the prosecution to investigate and, where possible, disprove that version; it is not for the defence to prove that the notice was correct, but for the prosecution to show that it undertook a genuine and adequate effort to test it. As the Court of Appeal further explained in Rengarajan Thangavelu v PP [2014] MLRAU 495, an Alcontara Notice must contain sufficient particulars S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug to permit meaningful investigation, and must be given at the earliest opportunity, whether at the time of arrest or upon counsel first taking instructions. [73] In this case, the accused's account implicating a man named “Yuki” was put to SP4 during the prosecution stage itself, on 7.3.2025, well before the defence case commenced. SP4 denied it. The full name and particulars of “Yuki,” namely Muhammad Zulkifli bin Ishak, only became known to the defence later, through independent inquiries made with the Registrar's office; but this Court observes that the reason those particulars were not available earlier lies substantially at the door of SP4 himself, whose denial that he had gone to the scene with “Yuki,” and his failure to disclose Zulkifli's related arrest, suppressed from the defence, and from the Court, the very information that would have permitted an earlier and more particularised notice. It would be an unjust outcome if SP4's own incomplete or false evidence on this point were permitted to defeat the protection the Alcontara Notice framework is designed to afford an accused. Once notice in substance was given, the burden lay upon the prosecution to investigate, whether through SP3 or otherwise, and it did not do so; no further inquiry into Zulkifli's arrest was undertaken during the prosecution's case, notwithstanding that the means to do so, the name “Yuki” having been raised, existed.

6.8 The Prosecution's Failure to Adduce Rebuttal Evidence Leaves the Defence Case Unanswered S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug [74] Once SP4 was recalled and the matters addressed in Sections 6.2 and 6.5 above emerged, the prosecution called no further evidence. Although the prosecution did cross-examine SP4 regarding the descriptions in the reports, it called no further witness to explain or qualify the contradictions that had emerged. It did not recall SP3, the investigating officer, to address the question of the packaging coincidence, notwithstanding that SP3 was the officer to whom SP4 handed over both sets of exhibits that night. It did not produce the Magistrates' Court record arising from Zulkifli's own prosecution, notwithstanding that Exhibit D16 shows that record to exist. It called no witness to give evidence as to the routine availability or otherwise of packaging of the description in question. [75] As the High Court held in PP v Mohd Zurizal bin Saad, whilst it remains the right and discretion of the prosecution not to call any particular rebuttal witness, the exercise of that discretion must not result in a failure of the prosecution's overarching duty to prove its case beyond reasonable doubt; where a gap in the prosecution's case is left unaddressed by rebuttal evidence, the benefit of that gap must be given to the accused. This Court respectfully adopts that approach. The matters raised by SD2 and by SP4's own recalled evidence were substantial, went to the heart of the prosecution's account of possession, and were left, on the record before this Court, unanswered.

6.9 The Absence of Independent Forensic Evidence Is a Relevant, Though Not Determinative, Consideration [76] The prosecution submits that the absence of fingerprint or DNA evidence connecting the accused to the seized exhibits is an investigative omission of no legal consequence, given the direct eyewitness evidence of SP4. This Court accepts that the absence of forensic corroboration is not, without more, fatal to a prosecution case founded on credible direct evidence. However, that absence cannot be assessed in a vacuum. In this case, the entirety of the prosecution's case on physical possession rests upon a single witness whose evidence, for the reasons given in Section 6.2 above, has been shown to be unreliable on a closely related and material point. In those particular circumstances, the absence of any independent corroboration, whether forensic or otherwise, linking the accused to the exhibit in question becomes a matter properly weighed by this Court in assessing whether the prosecution's case, taken as a whole, remains proved beyond reasonable doubt.

6.10 The Three-Handphone Evidence Was Not Pursued in Final Submissions and Plays No Part in This Court's Findings [77] The accused's evidence, given both on 8.1.2026 and repeated on 22.1.2026, was that he carried three mobile telephones, one in his right pocket and two in his left, on the night in question, and that these were taken from him and S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug discarded from the moving vehicle in the course of his arrest; he further testified that this detail had been raised with the investigating officer by his counsel. However, the defence did not press this point in its final written submissions, and this Court accordingly treats it as not pursued. In any event, the only purpose for which this evidence was capable of assisting the defence was to support the submission that the accused's pocket was already occupied, and so could not physically have accommodated the drugs, a submission that this Court has rejected for the reasons given in Section 6.6 above, following the accused's own concession that the drug packaging fit within the pocket. The three-handphone evidence accordingly plays no part in this Court's findings. The reasonable doubt found in this judgment rests on the two grounds identified in Section 6.14 below, namely SP4's credibility and the unexplained packaging coincidence, neither of which has any connection to this evidence.

6.11 The Defence Case Is Not a Bare Denial [78] The prosecution relies on a line of authority, including PP v Ling Tee Huah [1982] 2 MLJ 324 (High Court), DA Duncan v PP [1980] 2 MLJ 195 (Federal court), and PP v Ho Sek Kong [2006] 5 CLJ 49 (High Court), for the proposition that a mere denial, unsupported by other proof, is not sufficient to dislodge the prosecution's case or to raise a reasonable doubt. This Court accepts the correctness of that proposition as a statement of law. It does not, however, S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug assist the prosecution on the facts of this case. The authorities relied upon each concerned an accused who did no more than deny the prosecution's account, without advancing any positive, testable alternative explanation. That is not this case. The accused gave a detailed, affirmative account of an alternative version of events, involving a named and identifiable third party; that account was corroborated in its material core by an independent witness, SD2, called from custody, with no evident motive to assist the accused; and that account exposed, through the recall of SP4, a demonstrable falsehood in the prosecution's own evidence. This is not a bare denial. It is a positive defence, tested and substantially unshaken on the points that matter, which the prosecution has failed to rebut.

6.12 The “No Reason to Lie” and “Invented Third Party” Submissions Are Distinguishable [79] The prosecution further submits, relying on PP v Shaaban b. Abd. Rahman [1989] 2 MLJ 313 (High Court) and PP v David Ackowuah Bonsu [1999] 2 CLJ 677 (High Court), that there is no discernible reason why its police witnesses would lie, and that their evidence, given in a clear and straightforward manner, ought to be accepted in full. The prosecution also draws an analogy with cases such as Mahmod Yary Mohammad & Ors v PP [2019] MLJU 200 (Court of Appeal) and Liang Youmei v PP [2019] MLJU 48 (Court of Appeal), in which an accused's reference to a previously unmentioned third party, said to be the true S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug culprit, was rejected as an invention where that person had never been named at any earlier stage of the proceedings and no independent evidence supported his existence. [80] Neither submission survives close comparison with the facts of this case. As to the first, this Court does not find, and does not need to find, that SP4 acted from any sinister or corrupt motive; a witness's evidence may be unreliable on a material point without any finding of deliberate malice being necessary. What matters, for present purposes, is not why SP4's evidence proved to be unreliable, but the objective fact, established by his own written report concerning the near-identical packaging, and by the sworn testimony of SD2 regarding his presence at the scene, that it was unreliable. The authorities relied upon by the prosecution address the willingness of a court to accept honest, consistent police evidence in the absence of any competing account; they do not address, and cannot assist on, a case in which the officer's own contemporaneous documentation contradicts his sworn testimony. [81] As to the second, the comparison with Mahmod Yary, Liang Youmei and similar cases in which an accused invokes a nameless or untraceable alternative culprit for the first time at trial is inapposite. Zulkifli was not a phantom conjured at the eleventh hour. His involvement was raised, in substance, during the prosecution's own case, by way of an Alcontara Notice question put to SP4 as early as 7.3.2025. He was subsequently identified, located, and produced as a S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug live witness who attended court from prison and gave evidence on oath, subject to cross-examination. His own arrest, on the same night, is independently documented in a police report authored by SP4 himself. This is the antithesis of the unsubstantiated, untraceable “Mehdi” figure rejected in Mahmod Yary; it is a named, produced, and independently corroborated witness whose existence the prosecution's own documents confirm.

6.13 The Section 37(da) Presumption of Trafficking Does Not Survive Doubt as to Underlying Possession [82] The prosecution submits, finally, that the accused's own account of his purpose at the scene, namely collecting drugs for his workers, is in any event consistent with trafficking rather than personal use, and that this supports a finding that any presumption of trafficking under section 37(da) has not been rebutted. This submission assumes, as its starting premise, that the accused was in possession of the drugs at all. For the reasons given at paragraph above, that is precisely the matter in doubt. The presumption of trafficking under section 37(da) is a presumption that operates upon proved possession; it does not operate to prove possession itself. Where, as here, the totality of the evidence, including SP4's demonstrated unreliability, the corroborated presence of Zulkifli and his vehicle at the scene, and the unexplained packaging coincidence, notwithstanding the outcome of the physical demonstration before this Court, leaves this Court in reasonable doubt as S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug to whether the accused was ever in physical possession of the drugs as alleged, the statutory presumption of trafficking has no proved foundation upon which to operate, and no question of its rebuttal on a balance of probabilities properly arises.

6.14 Overall Assessment [83] The accused gave sworn evidence, consistently maintained under sustained cross-examination, that the drugs were never in his pocket. Although he conceded, under cross-examination during the acu pakai demonstration, that the drug packaging was physically capable of fitting within that pocket, a concession which disposes of the defence's earlier submission that this was physically impossible, that concession goes only to capacity and not to the separate question of whether the drugs were in fact placed there on the night in question. It was corroborated, on the essential facts of the scene, by SD2, an independent witness with no apparent motive to assist the accused, called from prison, who placed himself, his motor car, and the accused together at Pandan on the night in question, in direct contradiction of SP4's account that Zulkifli was elsewhere. The prosecution, faced with all of this, called no rebuttal evidence of any kind on the matters going to SP4's credibility and the packaging coincidence. [84] Taken together, these matters raise, in the assessment of this Court, a reasonable doubt as to two connected issues S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug central to the prosecution's case: first, whether Zulkifli and his red Suzuki Swift motor car were present at the scene of the accused's arrest, contrary to SP4's evidence; and second, how it came to be that two arrests, conducted by the same officer on the same night, each yielded an item of near-identical description, a bright pink plastic bag bearing the words “Terima Kasih,” a coincidence the prosecution left wholly unexplained. These two matters, considered together, leave this Court unable to feel that abiding and settled conviction as to the truth of the charge that proof beyond reasonable doubt requires, a standard explained in PP v Saimin & Ors [1971] 2 MLJ 16 (High Court) as a doubt that is not fanciful or imaginary but one arising from the evidence itself, or from the want of it, and which settles in the mind and finds a resting place there. This conclusion does not rest on, and is not weakened by, the outcome of the acu pakai demonstration addressed in Section 6.6 above. That demonstration disposed of a narrower and distinct defence submission concerning the physical capacity of the pocket; it does not touch the more fundamental doubt raised by SP4's credibility and the unexplained packaging coincidence, which go to whether the accused was the person from whom the drugs were in fact recovered at all. SECTION 7: CONCLUSION AND FINAL VERDICT [85] This Court has set out, in Sections 5 and 6 above, its reasons for finding that the defence evidence, taken S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug together with the whole of the evidence before this Court, raises a reasonable doubt as to the prosecution's case on the element of possession, and, in consequence, as to the proper operation of the statutory presumption of trafficking under section 37(da) of the DDA which depends upon that element. It remains only to draw the threads together and to record this Court's final determination. [86] The burden of proof beyond reasonable doubt rests, as it has throughout these proceedings, upon the prosecution. That burden does not shift to the defence save in the limited and specific circumstances of a statutory presumption properly invoked; and, for the reasons given at Section 6.13 above, no such presumption survives on the facts of this case once reasonable doubt has been raised as to the underlying fact of possession itself. As the Federal Court held in Gunalan a/l Ramachandran v PP, an accused who succeeds in raising a reasonable doubt on the prosecution's case is, without more, entitled to an acquittal; it is not necessary for this Court to be satisfied that the accused's account is true, only that it is capable of raising, and does raise, such a doubt. The defence submits, and this Court accepts, that this is consistent with the observation in Liew Siew & Anor v PP [1969] 2 MLJ 232 (High Court), namely that all the defence need do is raise a reasonable doubt on the truth of the prosecution's evidence in order to be entitled to an acquittal. S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug [87] This Court has evaluated the prosecution's evidence and the defence's evidence together, as a single body of material, in accordance with section 182A of the Criminal Procedure Code and the guidance given in Balachandran v PP. The prosecution's case, sound and properly established at the close of its own stage on the basis of SP4's then-unchallenged testimony, has since been materially eroded by matters which emerged only at the defence stage: the demonstrated unreliability of SP4 on a point going to the very heart of his account; and the independent and substantially unshaken corroboration, from SD2, of Zulkifli's and his vehicle's presence at the scene, which in turn corroborates the unexplained coincidence of near-identical drug packaging across two arrests conducted by the same officer on the same night. The acu pakai demonstration, on this Court's corrected finding set out in Section 6.6 above, does not form part of this erosion; it disposed of a narrower defence submission concerning physical capacity, and this Court's conclusion does not depend upon it. The prosecution, confronted with each of these matters, called no evidence in rebuttal. [88] In these circumstances, this Court is not left with that abiding and settled conviction as to the truth of the charge which proof beyond reasonable doubt requires. The doubt that has been raised is not fanciful, imaginary, or the product of speculation; it arises directly from the evidence adduced at trial, and from the prosecution's own failure to meet that evidence with any answer. Applying the standard S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug explained in PP v Saimin, this Court finds that the prosecution has failed to prove its case against the accused beyond reasonable doubt at the close of the whole case, as required under section 182A(1) of the Criminal Procedure Code and as applied in Balachandran v PP. [89] Accordingly, Yogesan a/l Krishnan is found not guilty of the charge under section 39B(1)(a) of the Dangerous Drugs Act 1952, and is acquitted and discharged. 6 July 2026 ATAN MUSTAFFA YUSSOF AHMAD Judge High Court of Malaya Johor Bahru S/N In4eVxnvMEi0g8d7Jy/fug COUNSEL: For the Accused: Dato’ Shanmugam a/l Ganesan, Encik Selvanteran a/l Segaran, Tuan Amar Ajwad, Encik Vinodhran Mohan, Messrs M.Thanakumaran & Shan, 51a, Lorong Blm 1/4, Bandar Laguna Merbok, 08000 Sungai Petani, Kedah For the Prosecution: TPR Tuan Muhammad Syafiq bin Mohd Ghazali, TPR Puan Lydia binti Salleh, TPR Umar Faiz bin Abdul Kohar, TPR Puan Nur Natasha binti Saharuddin, Pejabat Penasihat Undang-Undang Negeri Johor, Aras 2, Bangunan Dato’ Ja’afar Muhammad, Kota Iskandar, 79100 Nusajaya, Johor.