Lawyer’s article wasmisleading, says MinLaw
THE Ministry of Law has called “erroneous” the examples that criminal lawyer Subhas Anandan cited in a recent article to show apparently discriminatory treatment in the matter of compounding offences.
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Said the ministry, in a letter to Today: “There is only one set of laws, and all are equal before the law.” The Courts’ decisions, it added, are based on “all the relevant facts and circumstances, and in accordance with the law”.
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Mr Anandan had cited several cases — in an article in Probono, a publication of the Association of Criminal Lawyers of Singapore (ACLS), of which he is president — where the courts had refused to allow the accused to privately settle with the victims, apparently in the public interest. Mr Anandan also raised examples of well-off accused persons who managed to compound their alleged offences and questioned why “public interest was ignored” in those cases.
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“It was misleading forMr Anandan to cite isolated cases that have come before the Court as examples to support his conclusions,” MinLaw said.
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In one of his examples,Mr Anandan was acting for the company director facing road rage charges. The accused, who was driving a Mercedes Benz at that time, would fit into his “description of a ‘well-off’ accused”, but the court had withheld consent to the composition and the director was subsequently convicted,MinLaw rebutted.
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Any representations to the courts would be “considered objectively” by the Prosecution, it added.
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During an ACLS lecture last week, Attorney-General Walter Woon also noted that wealth is not a factor in the administration of justice here. He said: “The fact that the perpetrator is rich does not cut any ice, not with us.” TEO XUANWEI
THE Ministry of Law has called “erroneous” the examples that criminal lawyer Subhas Anandan cited in a recent article to show apparently discriminatory treatment in the matter of compounding offences.
.
Said the ministry, in a letter to Today: “There is only one set of laws, and all are equal before the law.” The Courts’ decisions, it added, are based on “all the relevant facts and circumstances, and in accordance with the law”.
.
Mr Anandan had cited several cases — in an article in Probono, a publication of the Association of Criminal Lawyers of Singapore (ACLS), of which he is president — where the courts had refused to allow the accused to privately settle with the victims, apparently in the public interest. Mr Anandan also raised examples of well-off accused persons who managed to compound their alleged offences and questioned why “public interest was ignored” in those cases.
.
“It was misleading forMr Anandan to cite isolated cases that have come before the Court as examples to support his conclusions,” MinLaw said.
.
In one of his examples,Mr Anandan was acting for the company director facing road rage charges. The accused, who was driving a Mercedes Benz at that time, would fit into his “description of a ‘well-off’ accused”, but the court had withheld consent to the composition and the director was subsequently convicted,MinLaw rebutted.
.
Any representations to the courts would be “considered objectively” by the Prosecution, it added.
.
During an ACLS lecture last week, Attorney-General Walter Woon also noted that wealth is not a factor in the administration of justice here. He said: “The fact that the perpetrator is rich does not cut any ice, not with us.” TEO XUANWEI
