Latest news with #legalhearing
CNA
17 hours ago
- CNA
'Oppressive' to send Indonesian fugitive Paulus Tannos to Indonesia: Lawyer
SINGAPORE: Sending Paulus Tannos to Indonesia will be oppressive to him due to the corruption there and because of the time that has passed since his alleged offence, his lawyer said on Tuesday (Jun 24). Lawyer Bachoo Mohan Singh revealed his 70-year-old client's argument against being extradited to Indonesia during the second day of the hearing into the matter. The three-day hearing will be to determine whether Tannos, a Singapore permanent resident wanted in Indonesia for his involvement in a high-profile corruption case, can be surrendered to Indonesia under the Extradition Act and the extradition treaty. His case is the first under the new extradition treaty between Singapore and Indonesia, which was signed in January 2022 and came into effect in March last year. The court here will not have to determine Tannos' guilt in the alleged graft, but it will have to assess if there is enough evidence to prove the elements of the offence in order to approve the extradition to Indonesia. Arrested in Singapore on Jan 17 this year, Tannos – also known as Tjhin Thian Po – has repeatedly declined to be surrendered to Indonesia, which has stalled extradition proceedings. A committal hearing for the matter was fixed from Jun 23 to 25. On the first day of the hearing on Monday, the state counsels and Tannos's lawyers wrangled over the admissibility of documents, comprising a formal request for extradition and a set of supplementary documents filed earlier this year on separate occasions. Tannos, represented by Mr Singh from law firm BMS Law, and lawyers Suang Wijaya and Hamza Malik from Eugene Thuraisingam LLC, argued that the supplementary documents should be struck out and the formal request rejected because the evidence was not in compliance with the extradition treaty. After hearing a response by the state counsels, Deputy Principal District Judge Luke Tan ruled on Tuesday afternoon that the documents were admissible and then admitted all of them into evidence. Tannos was arrested for his role in a corruption case linked to the Indonesian government's electronic identity card project that is said to have caused the country about 2.3 trillion rupiah (US$140 million) in losses. CROSS-EXAMINATION OF CPIB OFFICER The hearing on Tuesday later resumed with the cross-examination of the state's first witness, chief special investigator Alvin Tang from the Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau (CPIB) who stook the stand on Monday. Mr Singh led the cross-examination, focusing on CPIB's involvement in Tannos' arrest and asking if Mr Tang was aware that Tannos' family had arrived in Singapore in March 2012. The CPIB officer said he could not remember the exact date. Mr Singh then asked whether Mr Tang had thought it necessary to check if Tannos' wife had been out of Singapore in August 2012. This was the period when she was alleged to have handed money to another person who was linked to the corruption case. The lawyer told Mr Tang to check on this detail by the end of the trial, but the state counsels interjected to say that Tannos should not be directing the investigating officer on such matters. Mr Singh replied that this was "the least" CPIB could do given its abilities. However, Judge Tan said Tannos had no basis to make the request, prompting Mr Singh to say that he was asking Mr Tang to "do the right thing". Mr Singh was asked to move on with the cross-examination. "HARSH AND CRUEL" PRISON CONDITIONS Mr Singh also relayed Tannos' argument against his extradition after he briefly sparred with the state counsels over the issue of having "all cards on the table". Mr Singh contended that the state should have explained why certain supplementary documents were served on Tannos in June even though the papers were received in April. "They should tell us, we are in the process where all the cards are all on table," Mr Singh said. In response, State Counsel Vincent Leow said that the supplementary documents were disclosed after the state had reviewed them and were satisfied that they could assist the court. Mr Leow then pointed out that Tannos himself had yet to reveal his witnesses even though Mr Singh said that all cards should be on the table. Mr Singh told the court that his client's case against extradition would be grounded on the corruption in Indonesia and its "harsh and cruel" prison conditions. "We are saying you shouldn't send this man back to a place like that. We are saying ... that it will be oppressive," Mr Singh continued. "It will be oppressive to send him back because the matter has taken place so long ago, he will never be able to mouth a defence, witnesses have died and witnesses cannot be found," Mr Singh added, saying that legal experts would be called to the stand here to testify to the corruption and prison conditions in Indonesia. Mr Singh and his team will also argue that Tannos cannot be extradited because he has not been interviewed as a suspect and a statement recorded from him in that capacity. He added that Tannos had been interviewed in Singapore only as a witness by the Corruption Eradication Commission of Indonesia – known as the Komisi Pemberantasan Korupsi (KPK) – at least four times, with CPIB facilitating the process. The hearing was adjourned after Mr Singh asked for records that detailed the dates of these sessions. It will resume on Wednesday.
The Independent
19-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Independent
Tommy Robinson's latest bid to lower contempt sentence to be heard at High Court
Tommy Robinson's latest attempt to reduce the length of his prison sentence for the civil offence of contempt of court is set to be heard at the High Court on Tuesday. Robinson, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, was jailed for 18 months in October after admitting multiple breaches of an injunction made in 2021, which barred him from repeating false allegations against a Syrian refugee who successfully sued him for libel. Sentencing him at Woolwich Crown Court, Mr Justice Johnson said that the jail term would comprise a 14-month 'punitive' element and a four-month 'coercive' element, and that Robinson could have the latter taken off if he were to 'purge' his contempt. Robinson, who is currently due to be released on July 26, is now due to apply to purge his contempt at a hearing on Tuesday, which could secure his earlier release. In his sentencing remarks, Mr Justice Johnson said the coercive part of the sentence was 'intended to encourage and incentivise future compliance' with the injunction. He said: 'It is open to the defendant to purge his contempt and to seek the remittal of four months of the order, which would result in his earlier release. 'To do that, he would need to demonstrate a commitment to comply with the injunction.' Robinson admitted 10 breaches of the injunction last year, after the Solicitor General issued two contempt claims against him. The first alleged he 'knowingly' breached the order on four occasions, including by having 'published, caused, authorised or procured' a film called Silenced, which contains the libellous allegations, in May 2023. The film was pinned to the top of Robinson's profile on the social media site X, while he also repeated the claims in three interviews between February and June 2023. The second claim was issued in August last year and concerned six further breaches, including playing the film at a demonstration in Trafalgar Square in central London last summer. Handing down the sentence, Mr Justice Johnson said Robinson could 'purge' his contempt by taking steps such as removing 'Silenced' and other publications which breach the injunction from his social media accounts. Since being jailed, Robinson, who is currently held at HMP Woodhill in Milton Keynes, has lost two legal battles related to his imprisonment. In March, he lost a bid to bring a legal challenge against the Ministry of Justice over his segregation from other prisoners while behind bars, after his lawyers claimed it had caused an 'evident decline in his mental health'. Barristers for the MoJ told the court that Robinson had been moved to a closed wing as an 'interim position' after the prison received intelligence that 'two other prisoners at HMP Woodhill were plotting to assault the claimant to gain kudos and notoriety, and that the claimant had a 'mark on his head' and would be killed by a lifer if located on a wing'. Robinson then unsuccessfully challenged his sentence at the Court of Appeal in April, with three senior judges – including the Lady Chief Justice, Baroness Carr – finding there was 'no reasonable basis' to alter the prison term. They also said that Robinson could 'still reduce the period he has to spend in custody by taking the steps identified' by Mr Justice Johnson. The injunction was issued after Robinson was successfully sued by Jamal Hijazi, a then-schoolboy who was assaulted at Almondbury Community School in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, in October 2018. After a clip of the incident went viral, Robinson made false claims on Facebook, including about Mr Hijazi attacking girls in his school, leading to the libel case. Mr Justice Nicklin ordered Robinson to pay Mr Hijazi £100,000 in damages and his legal costs, as well as making the injunction preventing Robinson from repeating the allegations. Tuesday's hearing before Mr Justice Johnson is due to begin at 10am at the Royal Courts of Justice.
New York Times
09-05-2025
- New York Times
Menendez Brothers' Resentencing Hearing Is Set for Next Week
After resolving the latest round of legal hurdles, a Los Angeles judge has scheduled a hearing for next week to decide whether Lyle and Erik Menendez should be eligible for release after more than three of decades behind bars. The long-awaited resentencing hearing, which had first been scheduled for December and then was repeatedly postponed will now take place over two days, on May 13 and 14, the judge, Michael V. Jesic of Los Angeles Superior Court, said on Friday. Once again, family members of the brothers were arranging to travel to Los Angeles for the proceedings. Others, including people who were imprisoned with them and correctional officials who have overseen their incarceration, were planning to be there, too, to testify that the brothers have been rehabilitated and no longer represent a danger to the community. The Menendez brothers have behind bars since the spring of 1990, when they were arrested and charged with killing their parents the previous summer. The brothers had burst in to the den of the family home in Beverly Hills, Calif., and killed their parents with shotgun blasts as the couple watched television and ate ice cream. The crime, and the fact that it occurred in such a wealthy, exclusive community, captivated the country. And the case never fully ceded its grip on the nation's consciousness, maintained through numerous dramatic and documentary treatments. At their trials, the brothers had maintained that they had been sexually abused for years by their father, Jose Menendez, and that their mother, Kitty Menendez, was complicit because she knew of the abuse and did nothing to stop it. They said they killed out of fear for their own lives, worried that their parents would kill them first to prevent disclosure of the family's secrets. At their first trial, the brothers were tried together but with separate juries. The judge gave wide latitude to the defense to offer testimony and evidence about sexual abuse, and the trial was televised to a national audience. Each jury deadlocked and a mistrial was declared. In the years following their convictions, the brothers seemingly exhausted every legal avenue to have their cases reviewed. And then last fall, after two new shows appeared on Netflix — a dramatic series by the producer Ryan Murphy and a documentary — new legal possibilities emerged. At the same time, social media campaigns on the brothers' behalf, organized by young people who believe the sexual abuse evidence should have been a mitigating factor at trial, put pressure on officials to reconsider the case. Last fall, George Gascón, then the district attorney of Los Angeles, asked a court to resentence the brothers to 50 years to life with the possibility of parole. Because the brothers were younger than 25 at the time of the crime, the sentence sought by Mr. Gascón would have made them immediately eligible for parole. Then, Mr. Gascón was defeated in November's election by Nathan Hochman, whose campaign urged a more punitive approach to prosecuting crime. Mr. Hochman had a very different view of the Menendez brothers, and he has opposed resentencing them, saying they had failed to demonstrate 'full insight' into their crimes. Specifically, he said Lyle, now 57, and Erik, now 54, had never disavowed their contention that they had acted in self-defense, which Mr. Hochman has called a lie. Mr. Hochman tried to withdraw Mr. Gascon's resentencing petition, but Judge Jesic rejected his request. On Friday, Mr. Hochman once again asked the court to allow his office to withdraw the petition based on new information from a recently completed report by the state's parole board about the brothers' time in prison. That report was put together on behalf of Gov. Gavin Newsom, who is separately considering clemency for the brothers. Speaking in court, Mr. Hochman said the report cited rules violations by the brothers, including their use of cellphones. Judge Jesic, however, said the report, which remains under seal, did not include much new information, and he denied Mr. Hochman's motion to withdraw the petition. Given Mr. Hochman's stance, the proceedings have become increasingly adversarial, and the brothers' lawyers briefly sought to have the district attorney's office recused from the case. But one of the brothers' lawyers, Mark Geragos, withdrew the request on Friday in the interest of moving the proceedings along, he said.
