PUTRAJAYA: The Court of Appeal yesterday sentenced former athletics coach C. Ramanathan to 12 months' jail for molesting two junior athletes 19 years ago.
A three-man bench led by Datuk Mohd Hishamudin Mohd Yunus unanimously dismissed Ramanathan's appeal against conviction, but varied the jail sentence of four years to a year, which was to run concurrently.
Following yesterday's ruling, Ramanathan, 75, a former teacher, walked out a free man as he had served 10 months in Kajang Prison.
Convicts get one-third remission for good behaviour while in prison. However, he will lose his pension.
Hishamudin, who sat with Datuk Abdul Wahab Patail and Datuk Linton Albert, said the court found no merit to overturn the conviction.
"However, in reducing the sentence, we considered Ramanathan's age and the long years the appeal has taken."
Deputy public prosecutor Awang Armadajaya Awang Mahmud submitted that then High Court judge Tan Sri Abdull Hamid Embong had weighed all evidence and came to the right conclusion in upholding the conviction of the trial court.
Ramanathan said the allegations that he massaged young females was misconstrued as if he was doing a "dirty job".
"It was only a sports massage. I have been successful with athletes as this was part of the preparation to keep them injury-free."
Ramanathan was charged on Oct 4, 1994, with outraging the modesty of the athletes in a room at the Malaysian Basketball Association building in Kuala Lumpur in October 1992.
The Sessions Court sentenced him to four years' jail on each charge, the sentences to run concurrently, in 1996.
In 2005, Abdull Hamid allowed Ramanathan's appeal and quashed his conviction on grounds that a five-year delay in giving the written judgment by the Sessions Court judge was a miscarriage of justice.
However, following an appeal by the public prosecutor, a three-man Court of Appeal bench in July 2008 reinstated the conviction and sentence of the Sessions Court.
Ramanathan then spent time in prison. But he filed for a review of the Court of Appeal ruling which was heard by a different panel.
Judge Datuk Seri Gopal Sri Ram, who chaired the panel, then ordered Abdull Hamid to write his grounds of judgment on the substantive merits of the case.
On May 10, Abdull Hamid, now a Federal Court judge, said he accepted the evidence of the athletes and rejected Ramanathan's defence.
A three-man bench led by Datuk Mohd Hishamudin Mohd Yunus unanimously dismissed Ramanathan's appeal against conviction, but varied the jail sentence of four years to a year, which was to run concurrently.
Following yesterday's ruling, Ramanathan, 75, a former teacher, walked out a free man as he had served 10 months in Kajang Prison.
Convicts get one-third remission for good behaviour while in prison. However, he will lose his pension.
Hishamudin, who sat with Datuk Abdul Wahab Patail and Datuk Linton Albert, said the court found no merit to overturn the conviction.
"However, in reducing the sentence, we considered Ramanathan's age and the long years the appeal has taken."
Deputy public prosecutor Awang Armadajaya Awang Mahmud submitted that then High Court judge Tan Sri Abdull Hamid Embong had weighed all evidence and came to the right conclusion in upholding the conviction of the trial court.
Ramanathan said the allegations that he massaged young females was misconstrued as if he was doing a "dirty job".
"It was only a sports massage. I have been successful with athletes as this was part of the preparation to keep them injury-free."
Ramanathan was charged on Oct 4, 1994, with outraging the modesty of the athletes in a room at the Malaysian Basketball Association building in Kuala Lumpur in October 1992.
The Sessions Court sentenced him to four years' jail on each charge, the sentences to run concurrently, in 1996.
In 2005, Abdull Hamid allowed Ramanathan's appeal and quashed his conviction on grounds that a five-year delay in giving the written judgment by the Sessions Court judge was a miscarriage of justice.
However, following an appeal by the public prosecutor, a three-man Court of Appeal bench in July 2008 reinstated the conviction and sentence of the Sessions Court.
Ramanathan then spent time in prison. But he filed for a review of the Court of Appeal ruling which was heard by a different panel.
Judge Datuk Seri Gopal Sri Ram, who chaired the panel, then ordered Abdull Hamid to write his grounds of judgment on the substantive merits of the case.
On May 10, Abdull Hamid, now a Federal Court judge, said he accepted the evidence of the athletes and rejected Ramanathan's defence.
Poor Rama, where is the boundary between massage and molest?
ReplyDeleteEspecially in a country where touching hands is prohibited. Those athletes may have framed the poor old man up. Okay at his age what can he really do to these athletes ? At most a DOM.
Gopal Sri Ram ask to write the judgment surely there is a reason miscarriage of Justice and now the hero is a federal court Judge that embong chap
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