Malaysiakini
Soon Li Tsin
July 3, 2007
With an impeachment proceeding hanging over her head, key prosecution witness Rohaniza Roslan today dropped a bombshell in the Altantuya murder trial, claiming that she had been threatened not to testify by a mystery man.
Rohaniza, 29 (right) told the court this morning that she received the threat through a telephone call on June 11.
She said the caller, whom she identified as a male and believed to be a Malay, told her that she would be shot dead if she was to be a witness in this high-profile murder trial.
Rohaniza said that she immediately lodged a police report on the same day at the Pantai police station.
She added that she could not identify the number of the caller as it was listed as a ‘private number’.
Yesterday the prosecution shocked everyone in the court by announcing that it sought to impeach lance corporal Rohaniza on the grounds that her testimony in court contradicted her original statement which she gave to the police.
Deputy public prosecutor Noorin Badaruddin then listed at least five areas of contradiction after they had gone through Rohaniza’s 16-page witness statement.
Police pressure
This morning when the court resumed its hearing, Noorin outlined in detail the discrepancies in the testimony of the prosecution’s own witness to High Court judge Mohd Zaki Md Yasin.
These included conflicting statements by Rohaniza on the number of people who were in a green Suzuki Vitara vehicle and her questioning of her then boyfriend – chief inspector Azilah Hadri – as to what had actually happened to Mongolian national Altantuya Shaariibuu.
Rohaniza has testified that she left Abdul Razak’s house in her car along with Azilah and a “Chinese woman”, whom she identified from a photograph as being Altantuya.
Rohaniza said that they followed a four-wheel drive Suzuki Vitara, driven by a man with a cap, to Bukit Aman police headquarters. There, Azilah escorted Altantuya to the other vehicle which then drove off while he went inside to his office, she said.
But the prosecution said she gave a different answer in a Nov 16 statement recorded by police. In it, she said Azilah escorted Altantuya to the other vehicle and got inside with her.
Judge Zaki called it “a huge difference.”
“I want to maintain that Azilah did not enter the car,” Rohaniza responded.
Rohaniza told the court that she had given a different version of events to her earlier statement to the police because of pressure from the investigators.
“I was under tremendous pressure. I said something but something else was recorded” by investigators,” she told Mohd Zaki.
“They wrote things I never said,” added Rohaniza, who testified in her police uniform, with tears in her eyes.
“While I was remanded, they tortured me,” she said, referring to threats that she would be investigated for murder.
Rohaniza was remanded for 14 days last year to facilitate police investigations and was later released without being charged.
After a short break, High Court judge Mohd Zaki Md Yasin at 11.45am told Noorin to submit on the impeachment against Rohaniza only after the prosecution has wrapped up its case in questioning of all its witnesses.
Police promise of freedom
The court continued with the prosecution questioning Rohaniza about the death threat and police pressure.
Rohaniza told the court that before her cautioned statement was taken, a police officer from the Serious Crime Unit offered to free her and Azilah from the charge of murdering Altantuya.
She added that the officer who took her cautioned statement also promised to shorten her remand period.
As such, she said, she agreed with whatever was stated in the cautioned statement made under Section 112 of the Criminal Procedure Code on Nov 16, 2006.
Rohaniza could not remember the name of the officer. She also said that the same promises were made to her by a number of officers from the Technical Assistance Unit while she was under the 14-day remand.
“I was kept isolated in a hotel room… before giving the statement. I was under tremendous pressure. They pressured me, saying I could not go home and would be locked up again.”
Rohaniza earlier wept in court when asked to identify Azilah, who had been her boyfriend for nine years.
She testified they had been out for dinner together on Oct 19 last year when he received a phone call and they left for Abdul Razak’s house in her red Proton car, the night Altantuya was taken away in the car never to be seen again.
Azilah, 30, and corporal Sirul Azhar Umar, 35, are charged with the murder the Mongolian national while popular political analyst Abdul Razak Baginda, 47, is charged with abetting them.
Prosecutors say Abdul Razak planned her killing and ordered two police officers – members of a special unit charged with protecting the country’s leaders – to carry it out.
Altantuya was killed by “probable blast-related” injuries in a clearing in Shah Alam after she was driven away from outside Abdul Razak’s house in mid-October.
All three face the death penalty if found guilty.
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