KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 16 (NNN-BERNAMA) — Former Special Action Unit (UTK) personnel Azilah Hadri who is on death row for murdering Mongolian woman Altantuya Shaariibuu, has filed an application to review his conviction and death sentence imposed on him by the Federal Court in 2015.
In the application which was filed early this month at the Federal Court, Azilah, 42, among others is seeking a retrial in an open court.
Azilah also filed an affidavit and a statutory declaration (SD) to support his application.
The court has fixed tomorrow for case management before the Deputy Registrar of the Federal Court.
On Jan 13, 2015, the Federal Court overturned the acquittal of Azilah and another UTK personnel over the murder of Altantuya, an imposed the mandatory death sentence as murder is a capital offence.
The court set aside the Appeals Court’s acquittal of Azilah and Sirul Azhar Umar for the murder of Altantuya and restored the decision of the Shah Alam High Court which had found them guilty and sentenced them to death.
The then Chief Justice Tun Arifin Zakaria, who led the panel at the time, also issued a warrant of arrest for Sirul Azhar, who did not turn up in court.
Sirul Azhar, 47, has been in a detention centre in Australia for several years now after he fled to that country in 2014 while on bail.
Azilah and Sirul Azhar had been charged with the murder of Altantuya, 28, in Mukim Bukit Raja in Shah Alam between 10 pm on Oct 19 and 1 am the following day in 2006.
The Court of Appeal had on Aug 23, 2013, allowed the appeal brought by the two police commandos to set aside the 2009 Shah Alam High Court decision finding them guilty of murdering her and sentenced them to death.
Former political analyst Abdul Razak Baginda, 55, who was charged with abetting Azilah and Sirul Azhar, was acquitted by the High Court on Oct 31, 2008, after it (the High Court) held that the prosecution had failed to establish a prima facie case against him.
The prosecution did not appeal against his acquittal.
— MORE