Kota Kinabalu: A 37-year-old unemployed man was charged in the Magistrate’s Court, Thursday, with two counts of trafficking 52.36kg syabu last month.
Yap Kai, who was brought before Magistrate Lovely Natasha Charles, was accused of committing the offences on July 28 in house No.5, Lot 32, Lorong Manikar 2A, Taman Manikar here.
On the first count, Yap was accused of trafficking 1,926gm of syabu between 12.12pm and 1pm, while on the second count, he allegedly trafficked 50,437gm of syabu between 1pm and 2pm.
However, no plea was recorded from Yap, after the charges were read out to him.
Each charge is framed under Section 39B(1)(a) of the Dangerous Drugs Act 1952, which carries a punishment of either the death penalty or life in prison and whipping with a minimum of 15 strokes.
The prosecution applied for a new mention date while waiting for the chemist’s report and offered no bail to the accused as the charges against him have no provision for bail.
Lovely set Sept 12 for mention and ordered Yap be further remanded.
Yap was not represented.
It was reported on Aug 3 that the Sabah Customs seized the syabu worth RM1.8 million which according to Customs Director-General Datuk Zazuli Johan - was the largest seizure so far this year.
Meanwhile, 19 people were penalised for committing drug-related offences.
Eleven of them pleaded guilty to taking syabu while eight people admitted to having syabu.
The 11 – Thien Kui Loong, Muamar Faizal, Raysond, Ridwan Affandi, Alfred Martin, Norizam Saleh, Ervin Wong, Fadli Jaster, Hulk Horgan, Zaidi Yusop and Razalan Laji – were arrested at different locations here and in Penampang between April 21 and June this year.
Thien was sentenced to 10 months’ jail, Muamar was fined RM2,500 or eight months’ jail.
Norizam, Wong and Fadli were each fined RM2,000 or seven months’ jail while the rest were handed seven months jail each.
Taking drugs under Section 15(1) of the Dangerous Drugs Act provides for a fine of up to RM5,000 or up to two years’ jail on conviction.
The other eight were Jordan Jiman, Kasdatul Karim, Faizal Sukarno, Amin Saili, Sapik Iwan, Azhan Ajamain, Jason Fung and Nazman Omar were found to have syabu weighing 0.73gm and 0.12gm at separate locations here between Sept 11, 2021 and May 23 this year.
Jordan was sentenced to 18 months’ jail, Kasdatul was handed 14 months’ jail Faizal and Amin received 11 months’ jail each.
Sapik was handed nine months’ jail, Azhan and Fung were fined RM2,700 or 11 months’ jail each while Nazman was jailed eight months.
The charge, under Section 12 (2) of the Dangerous Drugs Act 1952, provides for a fine of up to RM100,000 or up to five years’ jail, or both, on conviction.
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