Fourth suspect in custodial death claims innocence

EXCLUSIVE Inspector S Hare Krishnan, the fourth suspect in N Dhamendran’s custodial death, says he is innocent and claims he was dragged into the case to “protect certain parties”.

This was revealed in a police report Hare Krishnan made on June 1, nine days after Dhamendran’s death on May 21, and two weeks before the inspector went into hiding.

A copy of the report obtained by Malaysiakini states that Hare Krishnan was not even in the Dang Wangi police station lock-up on the day Dhamendran died after horrific torture.

Dhamendran (right), 31, was found dead in a cell at the station 10 days after he was arrested over an alleged gunfight. The police initially claimed that he had died from breathing difficulties, but a post-mortem showed he had suffered 52 injuries, including staples in his earlobes.

In his police report, Hare Krishnan says he was on May 21 instructed by a superior officer to “release and re-arrest” Dhamendran while he was having lunch at a restaurant in Cheras.

The inspector said he subsequently ordered his subordinates to do so, but later discovered that Dhamendran’s re-arrest was done using his (Hare Krishnan’s) identification, without his consent.

“The officers made the arrest report using my PRS ID without my approval,” Hare Krishnan says in the report, which also states that he had gone back home right after lunch as he had a night raid to conduct that day.

He was notified of Dhamendran’s death at 4.30pm that day.

Hare Krishnan claims that there was an instruction to include his name in the lock-up diary, something which was also done without his knowledge and permission.

“All the entries of me in the lock-up diary are untrue and were done to implicate me and protect certain parties,” he says in his police report.

Police confirm report

According to Hare Krishnan, he did not “touch or beat” Dhamendran that day, and claims to know who “beat him, who was there and who knew about it”.

“I only got to know about the interrogation orders (on Dhamendran) when I reached the office later in the day, at 5.45pm,” the report says.

Hare Krishnan’s report was lodged at the Brickfields police station at 7pm on June 1.

Although the report is filed under the Dang Wangi police station, it is being investigated by the Tun HS Lee police station in Kuala Lumpur.

When contacted by KiniTV, police confirmed Hare Krishnan’s report.

However, KiniTV was told that the officer assigned to investigate the report is working for the D9 Unit, coincidentally the same unit that Hare Krishnan was working for.

Hare Krishnan is currently on the run, and the police released his photograph last Tuesday, in an effort to seek public help to track him down.

The police have claimed that he has gone missing from duty since June 15.
Three other suspects - police officers Jaffri Jaafar, 44, Mohd Nahar Abd Rahman, 45, and Mohd Haswadi Zamri Shaari, 32 - were on June 5 charged with the murder of Dhamendran.