Sentenced to 12 months in prison for committing gross indecency `allegedly’ at a cemetery?
Recently, a couple was charged and sentenced by a Magistrate for an offence under Section 377D of the Penal Code, read together with Section 34 of the same Act.
According to news report, the incident came to light after a video went viral on Facebook showing two individuals engaging in indecent behaviour at the cemetery.
A complainant who viewed the clip was instructed by the cemetery management to lodge a police report, leading to further investigation.
The 58-year-old male worked as a security guard earning RM1,800 monthly and supporting his wife, who has suffered a stroke, along with their two children while the 37-year-old female is single and financially dependent on her family.
Section 377D of the Penal Code states `Any person who, in public or private, commits, or abets the commission of, or procures or attempts to procure the commission by any person of, any act of gross indecency with another person’.
In layman’s terms, gross indecency typically refers to sexual acts deemed "against the order of nature" or severe public indecency.
Sexual acts, or sexual activities, are behaviors involving physical intimacy, stimulation of erogenous zones, or contact with reproductive organs for pleasure, reproduction, or emotional bonding.
Common examples include kissing, hugging, masturbation, oral sex, and genital intercourse. These actions are diverse in nature and expression.
Did anyone including the complainant saw a sexual act being committed or the complainant is presuming that since both the male and female are near naked, it is natural for them to have committed or are in the midst or about to commit some sexual act?
Isn’t that presumptous of the complainant and the prosecution and the magistrate to believe that a sexual act was committed just because a male and a female was in the same vicinity in a near nakedness situation?
From the video that went viral, both of them were not even in an intimate position or in a physical union but was standing apart in near nakedness.
In Jan 2020, the then AG announced that no prosecution will follow from the controversial sex videos allegedly implicating a then Minister and a former political aide because forensic video experts were unable to confirm the identities of the individuals in the video.
The decision was made despite the former political aide admitting openly that it was him in the video with the then Minister.
That video clearly showed a sex act being committed and yet the AG deemed it not tenable to prosecute whereas in this case, no sex act was recorded.
If this was the presumptous standard being applied, those found in swimming pools, dressing rooms in health spas, golf courses, badminton clubs would be equally guilty of engaging in indecent behaviour.
Who was offended?
Those buried there or the living who happened to pass by there?
Did the complainant felt violated and distressed by the sight of 2 individuals in a near naked position in a place where she should and have ought to explain her presence first?
In chinese culture, one does not go to a chinese cemetery unless for burial or during Ching Meng as it is taboo.
In the case against the present DPM, the AGC said the case was dropped due to insufficient evidence.
Were the magistrate and prosecution satisfied and convinced that a sexual act was committed to warrant a 12 months sentence on the male and female or they behaved and have the same EQ as many, that when 2 persons are in a near naked position and in near proximity to each other, it is obvious that they are there for a specific reason.
Would the magistrate and prosecution find it plausible if the male and female were to say that they accidentally stepped on a red ant colony which explains why they are in a near naked position as they need to dust down or shake off those red ants crawling all over their bodies?
Look at the photo.
Does any one in their sound and sane mind will believe that the woman in question is of sound mind?
By putting both away for 12 months, the Magistrate and the prosecution just `destroyed’ the lives of not only the male and female but also the wife of the man who is seriously ill and 2 young children.
Is society any better off with the 2 of them being put away?
Let’s have some empathy.
A small fine and a warning should suffice.
Not a damning sentence that will affect and destroy no less than 5 ordinary lives.
Those who stole from the tax payers are being let off in dubious circumstances while the poor and ordinary rakyat who cannot afford to hire some high price lawyers to defend them are given damning sentences.
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