He said this would prevent people from wondering whether their relatives or friends had been kidnapped and lodging police reports on missing persons.
Paulsen was commenting on the recent arrest of two Turkish citizens. Their wives thought they had been abducted until they saw IGP Khalid Abu Bakar’s tweet on the arrests.
Turgay Karaman’s wife, Ayse Gul Karaman, said the police never informed her of his arrest, even after a friend of his had lodged a report, thinking that he had been abducted.
Ainnurul Aisyah Yunos Ali Maricar, the wife of Ihsan Aslan, said she had gone through a similar trauma.
In his tweet, Khalid said Turgay and Ihsan were arrested on Tuesday in connection with activities that threatened national security.
Speaking to FMT, Paulsen said although certain laws, such as the Security Offences (Special Measures) Act 2012 (Sosma), did not require the police to inform family members after an arrest, the police should understand that informing family members would avoid confusion.
“Common sense dictates that the police should inform family members instead of leaving them in the dark and causing ridiculous things like this kidnapping fiasco,” he said.
“The police are only making their own jobs harder when they don’t inform family members.
“All suspects have rights and the authorities must help them exercise those rights. The suspects can only exercise those rights if their whereabouts are known,” he said.