A Cook Islands shipping company’s RM6.6 million lawsuit over crew detention and cargo seizure has been dismissed by the Johor Bahru High Court.
JOHOR BAHRU: The Johor Bahru High Court has dismissed a lawsuit filed by a foreign shipping company against the Malaysian government and police over the 2021 detention of a vessel’s crew and seizure of its cargo.
In his grounds of judgment, Judge Datuk Seri Shamsulbahri Ibrahim ruled that Blue Ocean Shipping Limited had no legal standing to bring a claim for wrongful detention on behalf of the crew of the MV Chita 2.
The judge stated that any claim for wrongful detention should have been filed by the crew members themselves, not the company.
He also held that the company was not entitled to claim US$1.4 million (approximately RM6.6 million) in damages as there was no documentary evidence to support the claim.
Blue Ocean Shipping, registered in the Cook Islands, filed the suit in 2021 against the government and police, seeking the damages over the alleged wrongful detention and loss of income from the cargo.
The company named several defendants, including former Johor police chief Tan Sri Ayob Khan Mydin Pitchay, former Home Minister Datuk Seri Hamzah Zainuddin and the Malaysian government.
Blue Ocean claimed that on March 8, 2021, the MV Chita 2, sailing from Batam, Indonesia to Yangon, Myanmar with a cargo of cigarettes and 11 crew, was detained near Pulau Kukup, Pontian.
The crew were released on March 12 after a Magistrate’s Court rejected a police remand application, but were subsequently re-arrested under the Immigration Act.
On March 21 that year, the crew were charged and later convicted in the Magistrate’s Court under the Customs Act, before being acquitted by the High Court on appeal in October 2023.
Blue Ocean contended that the MV Chita 2 was in international waters at the time of the detention and that the arrest of the crew was therefore unlawful.
The defendants denied the claim, stating the detention was based on intelligence indicating the vessel was carrying contraband cigarettes intended for distribution in Malaysia.
