Indonesian teen charged with offering RM25,000 bribe to GOF personnel

TAWAU: An Indonesian teenager was charged in the Sessions Court here today with bribing a General Operations Force (GOF) personnel with RM25,000, last month.
However, no plea was recorded from Syamsul Mudassir, 18, a madrasah student in Indonesia, pending transfer of the case to the Corruption Court.
He is accused of offering the bribe to the personnel, at the jetty of the GOF's Battalion 14 command post in Wallace Bay at 7.30pm on March 27, this year.
The money was allegedly an inducement to refrain from taking action against three Indonesian men who were being detained on suspicion of trying to smuggle out cooking gas cylinders, a scheduled controlled item, to Indonesia.
The accused is charged under Section 17(b) of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) Act 2009, punishable under Section 24(1) of the same Act.
If found guilty, he faces a jail term of up to 20 years and a fine of five times the amount of bribe or RM10,000, whichever is higher.
Judge Egusra Ali did not grant bail and set May 11 for remention.
Deputy public prosecutor Rozanna Abd Hadi represented the MACC while the teenager was represented by counsel Gani Zeliki. — Bernama