“He pleaded guilty on his free will and, as such, the conviction stays,” N Sivananthan said.
The lawyer said this in response to what effect it had on Tan Eng Boon’s conviction and sentence after the prosecution yesterday applied for a discharge not amounting to an acquittal on Tengku Adnan’s charge to allow the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) to conduct further investigations.
Sivananthan said it was likely that Tan, too, would have been given a conditional discharge if he had claimed trial.
Deputy public prosecutor Julia Ibrahim told the High Court it was not sure how long MACC would need to investigate and a decision whether to proceed with the case would be made “after the new issue is resolved”.
FMT understands that Tan, 71, did not appeal against the fine imposed in September last year after the defence and the prosecution conducted a plea before trial judge Mohd Nazlan Mohd Ghazali.
When contacted, Tan’s lawyer, Faisal Moideen, declined to comment on events that took place in Tengku Adnan’s case.
Tengku Adnan, popularly known as Ku Nan, is said to have received RM1 million in 2013 from Tan to approve an application by Nucleus Properties Sdn Bhd (now known as Paragon City Development Sdn Bhd) to increase the industrial plot ratio of a piece of land on Jalan Semarak, Kuala Lumpur.
The former minister’s trial was delayed for more than a year due to Tengku Adnan going to the Federal Court to seek to disqualify Nazlan on the grounds of bias, and the Covid-19 pandemic outbreak.
Tan was scheduled to be a prosecution witness in Tengku Adnan’s trial.
Meanwhile, lawyer A Srimurugan said the conditional discharge given to Tengku Adnan, who is also the Putrajaya MP, did not mean all proceedings against him had come to an end.
“The prosecution could reinstate the present charge and carry on where it stopped,” he said, adding that a fresh charge under any existing criminal law could also be framed against him.
He said the prosecution could drop the present charge and it need not return to the court to inform the judge.