A three-member bench, chaired by Justice Ahmad Zaidi Ibrahim, said there was no merit in the appeal by Radhakrishnan Syam, Fazril Farook, Sainulabdeen Siyad, Abdul Kalam Sajeev and Salim Sabeer against their High Court conviction in 2023.

Zaidi, who sat with Justices Azman Abdullah and Noorin Badaruddin, however, allowed the death penalty to be substituted with a jail term beginning from Aug 3, 2018.

They were sentenced to 30 years’ jail and ordered to be given 12 strokes of the rotan on each count.

The two jail terms will run concurrently, meaning that they will serve 30 years. In addition, they will be whipped 24 times, the maximum allowed under the law.

The five were charged under Section 39B(1) of the Dangerous Drugs Act 1952 for committing a preparatory act for trafficking dangerous drugs.

Two charges were framed against them as they were also found with about 1.5kg of methamphetamine and 2.7kg of ketamine.

According to the facts of the case, the five men were arrested in connection with a suspected illegal methamphetamine laboratory located deep in an oil palm plantation near Rantau town at about 6.30pm on Aug 3, 2018.

A police raid was first conducted on Aug 3 at a Hindu temple, where Radhakrishnan was arrested with another person while filling a container on a pick-up truck with water.

They led a police party to the plantation, where they arrested four others in a fenced-up area used as a laboratory to manufacture drugs.

Apparatus such as a weighing scale, a plastic bag sealer, heating devices and plastic and glass containers of various descriptions were also found.

A subsequent police investigation found that the land where the activities took place belonged to a resident who leased it to another person.

Deputy public prosecutor Noorhisham Jaafar appeared for the prosecution, while lawyer Sharonpal Singh represented the five accused.