This, Dr Mohd Suhani Mohd Noor said, indicated that the human trafficking syndicate could have been operating for several years prior to the discovery of the bodies.
Suhani said some could have died weeks prior to the discovery of the graves and the campsite. Post-mortems carried out also found that the bodies were at various stages of decomposition, he noted.
Suhani, who is Hospital Sultanah Bahiyah’s senior forensic consultant, was testifying at the royal commission of inquiry (RCI) into the discovery of mass graves and human trafficking camps in Perlis three years ago.
“From the post-mortems done, the time of death of three of the victims could be measured in weeks, not months or years.
“If we look from that perspective, there is the possibility that in January 2015, they were still alive. The victims could have been dead for weeks or months. They may have died around January.
“In my opinion, if you say a person has been dead for a few years, an estimation of three to four years is logical. Ten years may be too long,” he said, adding that the time of death would be less precise if a person died many years ago, as opposed to if the person had died two to three days earlier.
Suhani told the inquiry he led the post-mortems that were carried out on 114 bodies brought from Wang Burma and Wang Kelian to the hospital.
However, he said the cause of death could only be determined for two bodies, with one having died from pneumonia and another dying as a result of coronary artery disease
“The cause of death for 112 bodies could not be determined as they had been severely decomposed,” he said.
The bodies were also identified to be mainly from South Asia, and were aged anywhere from 10 years to above 40.
Suhani admitted that if post-mortems on the bodies had been carried out in January, there was a possibility the corpses could have been in a better condition.
Police discovered the campsite and the graves in January 2015, but the bodies were only exhumed towards the end of May the same year.
Meanwhile, Serdang Hospital forensics expert Dr Mohamad Azaini Ibrahim, who carried out post-mortems on eight of the bodies, pointed out that even with better technology, there was little that could be found once the body started decomposing.
“If the soft tissues and the cells have broken up, a lot of information will be lost,” he said.
The mass graves, 139 in total and 28 abandoned camps, were discovered at Bukit Wang Burma in Wang Kelian, near the Malaysia-Thailand border.
Over 100 skeletal remains, believed to be that of Rohingya refugees, were found in the graves.
The government at the time was criticised for the lack of action against top officials. Although four individuals were charged in court, critics said they were merely small-time traffickers.
The RCI, chaired by former chief justice Arifin Zakaria, resumes tomorrow.