People saw the accused being acquitted and walking out of the coutroom a free man as the victim's disheartened father attempted to throw himself out of the window.
The distress has transcended beyond the inflicted family to the entire community. Thousands offered the wreaths at murder scene on own initiatives, pursuing the lost justice at the same time.
The Chee family as well as the rest of us used to have high expectations for the verdict on this case, thinking that justice could be done through the country's impartial judiciary. Unfortunately, a heinous crime now comes to a perfunctory conclusion following the exasperating verdict.
The suspect once went into hiding in Australia to evade investigations and the court ruled that the semen specimen did belong to him.
Why then wasn't the suspect convicted even with the availability of material evidence (the semen)?
And why was he only charged for murder and not rape?
It would deal a severe blow to the country's judiciary as well as justice if the perpetrator was allowed to walk freely owing to some human negligence.
The case reminded me of the OJ Simpson trial plagued by human factors.
The celebrated American football player's ex-wife and boyfriend were murdered with multiple stab wounds and police clues pointed to Simposn as possible killer.
Knowing that he was being hunted by the police, Simpson tried to escape in his car, and a highway chase ensued. The entire process was captured by a TV camera from helicopter.
The intended escape consolidated the assumption of the police and society.
Traces of Simpson's blood were found at the crime scene that matched the DNA analysis. Simpson was not supported by an alibi while statements from several witnesses were all unfavourable to him.
The police were flushing with confidence for a murder conviction with all the evidences they had in hand, especially the blood specimen.
Simpson's vast resources allowed him to hire a good legal team of senior criminal lawyers, law experts and forensic scientists to his defence.
The lawyers were well aware the blood specimen served as the most effective evidence of Simpson's involvement, so they artfully claimed irregularities in the collection, analysis and retention procedures of the specimen, leading to possible inaccuracies in the identification.
They eventually succeeded in overthrowing the reliability of the material evidence, and under the principle of presumption of innocence, charges by the prosecution were overruled and the jury ruled that Simpson was not guilty.
Members of the jury later confessed they believed Simpson was guilty of murder, but thanks to the lapses in the police's evidence-collecting procedures and negligence on the part of the prosecution, they had not been able to convict the suspect.
This case remains very much unsettled to this day, the truth yet to be unearthed and the perpetrator yet to receive his punishment.
The two-decade-old case has become an important case study in the US judiciary that provides a good ground to trace areas of mismanagement, especially in prosecution works.
All that we can hope from Chee Gaik Yap's rape-murder case is that the prosecution would not give up hope and justice could be done some day.
- Sin Chew Daily
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