No written judgment, man convicted of raping stepchild gets retrial

The Muar High Court has overturned a man's 20-year prison sentence for raping his stepchild due to the trial judge's failure to provide written grounds for the conviction. Judicial commissioner S Kalyana Kumar ordered a retrial, stating that the original judge did not offer any meaningful oral reasoning during the trial, and the records only indicated a brief decision that a prima facie case had been proven.

The accused, a 42-year-old man, was previously found guilty of the rape in August 2022 and sentenced to 20 years in prison and 10 cane strokes. The man appealed the conviction and sentence, claiming that a proper written judgment was necessary for the appeal under the Criminal Procedure Code. Kalyana Kumar also noted that the trial was heard by two different judges, with the second judge not witnessing the main prosecution witness's testimony, which was the complainant in this case.