Justice Vazeer Alam Mydin Meera, who led a three-member bench to hear the appeal, said many issues were raised during submissions by the prosecution and the defence which required the panel’s consideration.
“Judgment is reserved because we need to go through the evidence in detail. Parties will be informed when we are ready. It will not be too long,” he said.
Also hearing the appeal were Justices Ahmad Zaidi Ibrahim and Azhahari Kamal Ramli.
On June 21 last year, the Shah Alam High Court acquitted Nazrin’s widow Samirah Muzaffar, 47, and two teenagers of murdering him at his home in Mutiara Damansara on June 14, 2018.
Justice Ab Karim Ab Rahman held that the prosecution had failed to establish a prima facie case because there was no direct evidence to implicate the accused.
Karim said he accepted the testimony of Kuala Lumpur fire and rescue department director Edwin Galan Teruki and investigating officer Halim Zulkefeli that the fire had been started deliberately.
He said he also accepted the evidence of Dr Prashant Samberkar, who testified that the cause of death was Nazrin’s head injury, which was the result of “multiple blunt (force) impact to the head”.
Prashant was the second pathologist to conduct a post-mortem on Nazrin.
Samirah and the teenagers have appealed these findings, submitting that Nazrin’s death was accidental, the result of a fire and blast from either a mobile phone or power bank.
Meanwhile, the prosecution says Nazrin was murdered with a hammer blow to his head. They say petrol was then used to set fire to his room and conceal the crime.
Today, lead counsel Shafee Abdullah submitted that Samirah could not have been so “stupid” as to kill and bury Nazrin on Hari Raya Puasa day in 2018.
“They were a loving and intimate couple, as revealed by text messages between the two a few days before the incident,” he said.
Shafee said the acquittal of the three should be upheld due to shoddy investigations by the authorities.
“There are many contradictions in testimony from prosecution witnesses and the defendants deserve the benefit of doubt,” he added.
Shafee said the evidence of forensic pathologist Dr Siew Sheue Feng was more credible than that of Prashant, who only examined Nazrin’s body after it was exhumed.
He said Prashant’s findings of post-mortem hypostasis (discolouration of the body) and rigor mortis (stiffening of the body) were arrived at without examining the corpse, and were wrong.
“He relied on photographs, which were available to him during the second post-mortem,” Shafee said, adding that this was how the prosecution sought to establish the time of death.
He said Prashant’s conduct was an afterthought and unprofessional.
Instead, Shafee urged the court to accept the testimony of Siew, who examined Nazrin’s body soon after his death.
“He only found stiffening of the body due to heat,” the lawyer said.
Shafee said most of the injuries suffered by the deceased were consistent with a blast pattern rather than the use of a hammer as claimed by the prosecution, he added.
Deputy public prosecutors Yusaini Abdul Karim, Amril Johari and Nur Sabrina Zuhairi appeared for the prosecution while counsel Rahmat Hazlan, Rahmat Abu Bakar and LS Leonard also represented Samirah and the teenagers.