At the outset of the hearing today, deputy public prosecutor Ku Hayati Ku Haron informed the three-member Court of Appeal bench that she would not be challenging Khairul Ikhwan Kassim’s appeal.

No reason was given to judges Nor Bee Ariffin, M Gunalan and Hashim Hamzah.

FMT understands the accused should not have been jointly charged for the offence as the firearm was discharged by another appellant, Ahmad Farid Mohamad Nasir, in the robbery where the victim was a senior civil servant.

Nor Bee said Khairul’s conviction was unsafe and set aside the High Court decision.

“We allow the appeal and acquit the second appellant (Khairul),” she said.

The bench, however, affirmed the death penalty imposed on Farid, 30.

“We are satisfied that there was no plain error by the trial judge in convicting the first appellant (Farid),” Nor Bee said.

Farid committed the offence against Nazaruddin Harun at 7.5km of the South Klang Valley Expressway (SKVE) at about 11.45pm on Jan 5, 2014.

He was charged under Section 3 of the Firearms (Increased Penalty) Act 1971 with shooting Nazaruddin on the hip during a robbery.

Khairul and Farid were in a car and had staged an accident, when Nazaruddin pulled his vehicle over to the road shoulder, where he was robbed.

Lawyer N Sivananthan appeared for Khairul and Farid.