KUALA LUMPUR: A lawyer of J. Bernard Kumar, who was savagely beaten up and stabbed with sharp objects at a condominium in Bukit Jalil by three men, said he was puzzled why police were treating his client’s assault case lightly.
Police have classified the case as rioting although his attackers had caused grevious hurt, which left him warded at a private hospital since the incident on Aug 15.
The lawyer, who did not want to be named yet, said his client was attacked so brutally that the case could possibly be classified as attempted murder.
“The definition of rioting is when two or more people fight with each other,” the lawyer said.
“Kumar neither provoked the fight nor did he fight back when attacked. A pair of scissors, glass shards and a snooker cue were used by the assailants.
“All this is so evident in closed-circuit camera footage that captured the whole incident. We are baffled as to how police investigators concluded that this was merely a case of rioting under Section 148 of the Penal Code?”
Bernard, 47, said police contacted him after the story was published in theSun. He received a phone call from a police officer yesterday who said he would pay him a visit to record his statement.
Resident L. Gerard Collin, a 54-year-old financial adviser with a bank, was among those who witnessed the attack and lodged a police report. He said he was also living in fear of retaliation after stepping forward as a witness.
Collin said he too was beaten up by a group of people whom he claimed was connected to a security official, hired to manage the condominium several years ago.
Another resident who declined to be named said the management was also terrified of the security official.
“The residents and management have been tolerating this high-handedness for almost a decade and are constantly in fear,” he said.
He said another resident in his 40’s was also set upon and assaulted by the same group of people in front of his wife and son last month for honking at a car driven by one of them.
“He did not lodge a police report but was disturbed by the incident. He is unable to relate his encounter as he died three weeks later after falling off a stairway at the condominium on July 21. His body was found sprawled at the bottom of the stairs,” said the residents.
Cheras police chief ACP Mohamed Mokhsein Mohammed Zon told theSun on Sunday that two men aged 35 and 36 were arrested by police for investigations and they would meet Bernard to record his statement.
