Tag: Maldives Police Service

Humam’s confession used against Shan in Dr Afrasheem’s murder trial

The Criminal Court has today heard the prosecution’s evidence against H. Hikost Ali Shan in the case of MP Dr Afrasheem Ali’s murder.

Evidence was presented separately in support of four separate assertions: Shan’s involvement in conspiring to murder, his going to to Dr Afrasheem’s house with the intent of murder, attacking the victim with a sharp object, and Dr Afrasheem’s subsequent death from the attack.

The confession from the Hussein Human Ahmed – who was recently sentenced to death for Afrasheem’s murder – was used to back all four assertions. Humam later stated that the confession was obtained by the  Maldives Police Service through coercive means.

Other evidence presented include two confidential witnesses, audio recording and the script of a phone call, and Dr Afrasheem’s medical report and death certificate.

The defense also presented evidence at today’s hearing. Sun Online reported that the evidence was presented to prove that Shan was in ‘Jalapeno Restaurant’ from 9:00pm on October 1 2012 until 1:00am.

‘CNM‘ reported that Shan’s Defense lawyer Abdulla Haseen had requested anonymity for defense witnesses stating that, due to the nature of the case, revealing their identities could endanger their lives. The request was granted by the judge.

According to ‘Haveeru‘, a request for leniency regarding Shan’s detention was rejected, with the judge stating that more importance would be given to finishing the case as soon as possible, and that previous scheduled hearings were canceled upon requests from the prosecutor general. The court has been extending Shan’s detention since late 2012.

The judge has  said that a hearing is likely to be scheduled within the next week, and that the case will be concluded as soon as statements of the witnesses are collected.

Dr Afrasheem Ali, a moderate Islamic scholar who was at the time representing Ungoofaaru constituency in the People’s Majlis, was found brutally murdered at his apartment building on the night of October 1 2012.

Shan, along with Humam, was charged with with the murder. In a hearing on May 6 2013, Humam denied the charge before changing his statement and confessing to the murder. He also implicated several others investigated for the murder. After nine days, however, Humam retracted the confession saying that it had been obtained by police through coercive means.

Other suspects mentioned in Humam’s confessional statement – a key piece of evidence on both his own and Shan’s cases – included a juvenile  identified as ‘Nangi, a Maldives National Defence Force officer Azleef Rauf, Abdulla ‘Jaa’ Javid (son-in-law of opposition Maldivian Democratic Party Chairperson ‘Reeko’ Moosa Manik), Jaa’s brother Jana, and another person identified only as ‘Spy’.

In December 2012, then Commissioner of Police Abdulla Riyaz described the murder as a “‘preplanned politically motivated act of terrorism carried out by politicians”.

He also said that both Humam and Shan belonged to a local gang who often carry out criminal acts for politicians and businessmen. Riyaz said that MVR14million was paid for the murder.

Politicians have similarly blamed the recent stabbing of MP Alhan Fahmy on criminal gangs with political paymasters.

Shan, who was arrested at the time of Riyaz’s press briefing, was only charged with the crime on  April 21 2013, where he requested to appoint a defense attorney for himself.

A hearing was held again on 5 May 2013, during which Shan’s defense refused to respond to charges until the findings of police investigations and statements of witnesses were presented. Agreeing to grant the request, the judge said that it was the prosecutor’s wish that it should not be presented.

Since May 2013 several scheduled hearings have been cancelled upon request from the prosecution, including one in July and December last year.

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Crime statistics reveal 46 percent spike in theft

Cases of theft reported to police last month increased by 46 percent compared to January 2013, according to crime statistics from the Maldives Police Service (MPS).

A total of 623 cases of theft were reported to police in January – an average of 20 cases a day – while 427 cases were reported in the same period last year.

Some 51 cases of theft and four cases of robbery have been reported so far in February.

Cases of robbery also rose from 54 in January 2013 to 88 cases last month.

Reported instances of theft had increased dramatically in 2012 compared to the previous year. While 4,734 cases of theft were reported in 2011, the number rose to 6,572 in 2012 – a 38 percent annual increase.

The figure climbed to 6,681 in 2013.

Robbery and theft currently account for roughly 50 percent of crimes reported to police.

Next to theft, the second highest number of cases reported in January 2014 involved drugs.

The number of drug cases filed last month reached 461, which represents a 56 percent hike compared to January 2013, during which police began investigating 295 cases.

The total number of crimes reported to police meanwhile increased by 20 percent compared with January of last year. While 1,742 cases were reported this year, the figure was 1,436 in January 2013.

Apart from theft, robbery, and drugs, other crimes reported in January this year included 100 cases of assault, 40 cases of sexual offences, 21 cases of domestic violence, six cases of counterfeit and forgery, 49 cases of vandalism, 17 cases of bounced cheques, 44 cases of embezzlement, and 150 lost items reported.

Meanwhile, at 189 cases, traffic accidents declined by eight percent last month compared to the same period in 2013.

Falling thieves

In November 2013, two men died after falling from buildings in the capital Malé during attempted robberies.

On November 15, a 29-year-old died of head injuries sustained in a fall from the fifth floor of the Galolhu Muthi residence.

One day later, a 31-year-old fell from the fourth floor of Henveiru Alikurige while attempting to jump on to the roof of a neighbouring house.

His foot reportedly got caught on an outdoor air-conditioning unit, which came loose and fell on his head.

Both thieves fell to their death while attempting to escape after being caught by the residents.

On January 7, a 27-year-old man fell from the fifth floor of Maafanu Mundhooge after a break-in. He survived the fall with minor injuries after landing on a pile of sand.

Three days later, a 32-year-old woman fell from the fourth floor of Manchangoalhi Light Corner during an alleged robbery attempt.

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Civil Court declares former police intelligence director’s arrest unlawful

The Civil Court has declared the Maldives Police Services’ arrest of former Director of Police Intelligence Sabra Noordeen on 16 March 2013 unlawful, unwarranted, and an ‘abuse of power’.

The court has also ordered the police to erase the record of the arrest and to issue a written apology.

Speaking to Minivan News today, Sabra said she had filed the case “because I wanted to set a legal precedent which would make the Police think about the wider rights and responsibilities they have to uphold before they exercise their powers.”

The police arrested Sabra upon her arrival at Malé International Airport on 16 March 2013 on the charge of “inciting violence” against a police officer on 5 March 2013 during the arrest of President Mohamed Nasheed. The police also confiscated her passport.

She was then handcuffed in order to be transferred to Dhoonidhoo prison. However, the police took her to Malé instead, and released her after issuing a summons to appear at the police station at a later date for questioning.

Sabra first appealed the Criminal Court warrant at the High Court and asked for compensation for damages. In August 2013, the High Court ruled the warrant valid, but said that Sabra should seek compensation at the Civil Court.

In yesterday’s verdict, the Civil Court noted the Criminal Court had not ordered the police to arrest Sabra, but had provided a warrant authorising her arrest upon the police’s request.

The court said she could only be arrested under such a warrant if there was “a necessity for her arrest”,  and if such a necessity ceases to exist, she should not be arrested “even if the warrant has not expired”.

The Civil Court noted that the High Court judges had deemed Sabra’s quick release on the day of her arrest to have been an indication of the lack of necessity for her arrest.

The Civil Court has also warned that the police’s abuse of power defeats the purpose for which the institution was founded, and would create doubt and fear about the the institution.

The verdict declared that Sabra’s arrest violated her right to protect her reputation and good name as guaranteed by Article 33 of the constitution, and the right to fair administrative action guaranteed by Article 43. The court also found that the police had acted against their primary objectives underlined in Article 244.

Following her arrest in March 2013, Sabra called for police reform in order for the institution to regain public confidence – including the dissolution of Special Operations unit and holding police officers accountable for misconduct and brutality.

“I quit the Maldives Police Service on 8 February 2012 with a profound sense of sadness for the institution and the colleagues I left behind. I do not believe that everyone in the MPS was involved in the mutiny or the coup and I do not believe in blaming everyone in a police uniform,” she wrote in an article detailing the events of her arrest.

Previously, the Criminal Court had declared the police’s arrest of incumbent Vice President Dr Mohamed Jameel Ahmed and the arrest of Ghassaan Maumoon, son of former President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, as unlawful.

In 2010, the Civil Court also declared the Maldives National Defense Force’s “protective custody” of current President Abdulla Yameen as unconstitutional, while the Supreme Court ordered the immediate release of both Yameen and Gasim Ibrahim (both members of parliament at the time).

Accusations of brutality and misconduct by MPS officers are common and have been confirmed by various independent state institutions. Among them are the Commission of National Inquiry (CNI) that looked in to the controversial power transfer of February 2012 and two constitutionally prescribed independent institutions – the Human Rights Commission of the Maldives and the Police Integrity Commission.

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PIC reluctant to cast doubt on election annulment, says Elections Commission

The Police Integrity Commission (PIC) has refused to investigate the confidential police forensic report – based on which the Supreme Court annulled the first round of the 2013 presidential election – because it could cast doubt on the legitimacy of the ruling, the Elections Commission has said.

Speaking at the People’s Majlis Commitee on Independent Institutions, EC member Mohamed Farooq said that the commission noticed serious issues in the Maldives Police Service (MPS) forensic report. According to Farooq, the EC found that many among the people who were considered deceased based on the forensic report were actually alive.

When the EC requested for the court’s permission to include those people in the eligible voters list, the court responded saying it did not declare anyone dead and the annulment of first round of elections was based on the police forensic report, Farooq said.

“Then we realised that it was more of a issue with the forensic report than the Supreme Court. And since it was prepared by the police, we submitted a complaint to the Police Integrity Commission, because they produced such a faulty report,” Farooq was quoted as saying in CNM.

Fraudulent allegations

According to Farooq, the PIC responded to the complaint saying that if a decision is made on the forensic report it could raise questions about the legitimacy of that case, and therefore the commission will not decide on the matter nor will they investigate the case further.

In the first round of elections former President Mohamed Nasheed of the Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) came first with 45.45 percent. President Abdulla Yameen of the Progressive Party of Maldives (PPM) came second with 25.35 percent, and the Jumhooree Party’s Qasim Ibrahim came third with 24.07 percent of the vote.

Qasim subsequently filed a case at the apex court citing fraud and vote rigging in the election. On October 7, the  Maldives Supreme Court annulled the first round.

The 4:3 verdict cited a confidential police report submitted to the court alleging 5,600 ineligible votes. It was said to be compiled by a team of MPS ‘forensic experts’ who worked inside the Supreme Court premises collecting and analysing evidence of the alleged vote rigging.

Later, when the People’s Majlis ‘241’ security services oversight committee requested for the report, then Commissioner of Police Abdulla Riyaz declined. The parliament have still not officially received the report, however a copy of the document was obtained and published by Minivan News.

Report’s impact could be huge: MP Sameer

The report was later shared with the EC, who will now review it and submit a report to the People’s Majlis Committee on Independent Institutions.

Speaking to Minivan News today, the committee chair MP Ahmed Sameer said the  group would review the EC report and take necessary action.

“The impact of this report is huge. If there is something wrong with the report we will have to look into it. It shall be discussed in the Majlis,” Sameer said.

The three dissenting judges in the Supreme Court case, Chief Justice Ahmed Faiz, Justice Abdulla Areef and Justice Muthasim Adnan in their dissenting opinion dismissed the confidential police report submitted by the Attorney General Azima Shakoor as invalid evidence as EC was not provided a right of response to the document.

The majority decision of court based on the secret police report cited 5,623 ineligible votes, while Faiz and Areef, after a comparison between the EC’s list of those who voted and the Jumhooree Party’s seven lists alleged of dead, underage, and repeated voters found only 473 cases (0.2 percent of votes) of irregular votes.

The two judges also stated that election laws do not allow for annulling the entire election in instances of fraud, and all three dissenting judges challenged the apex court’s constitutional jurisdiction over the case.

The confidential police report was also dismissed by the United Nations after an expert review of the document. “We feel confident in asserting that the election was all inclusive, there was no disenfranchisement and the quality of the voter register met international standards,” read a statement from UN Assistant Secretary-General for Political Affairs Oscar Fernandez-Taranco following his visit to the Maldives stated

Other local and international election observers, among them Commonwealth and Indian observers, also praised the conduct of elections, considering it free and fair.

Some people claimed to be underage in the secret police report were later found to be of voting age at the time, and some declared deceased in the report found to be alive.

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Minister assures improvements in education sector with new academic year

The Academic year 2014 began today as the Education Ministry promised improvement in students’ performance with the implementation of their first-hundred day road map.

“As they [hundred day plans] are implemented students will improve a lot. education sector will improve a lot. Therefore I request those who work in the education sector and parents to work with us in implementing them,” Minister of Education Dr Aishath Shiham said in a speech delivered to mark the beginning of the 2014 academic year.

She said the government’s education policy is to provide value based education for a civilized society, and pledged not to leave behind any child in this effort. She also called for a student centered approach in implementing education policies.

Vnews has reported that the ministry has assigned ninety five percent of teachers for 214 schools around the country and eighty percent of repair work at schools has also been completed.

According to the news agency, a record 830 students – twice the usual number- from various islands have been transferred to schools in the capital Male’ this year, under the ministry’s policy to grant transfer permission for all requests.

The Commissioner of Police Hussein Waheed has also issued a statement on the occasion, where he highlighted that the Maldives Police Service has initiated programs to sustain good behavior and discipline among students.

Waheed said that Maldives’ Police officers “will remain as role models guiding students to the right path” and that it would be a pleasure to provide any service necessary for the safety and security of students.

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Police examining reports of local celebrities’ misconduct in Sri Lankan nightclub

The Maldives Police Service has confirmed it is looking into allegations of sexual misconduct and consumption of alcohol made against local celebrities by news website “mvyouth”.

In a report recently published on the website,  Mvyouth accused seven local celebrities – actors, dancers, a singer, a fashion designer and a film director – of engaging in illegal activity at a Sri Lankan nightclub.

According to the website, four of their reporters traveled to Sri Lanka to confirm rumors about movie stars who frequently go to “party” there. The report says they followed the celebrities into a night club where they witnessed them getting drunk, dancing and being intimate, and kissing each other and other people at the club.

The Maldives penal code allows prosecution of crimes Maldivian citizens commit abroad. Kissing and sexual intimacy out of wedlock are considered as sexual offenses while consumption of alcohol is a hadd crime in shariah law, which guides the legal system in the country’s inhabited islands.

It also stated that some of the Maldivian group got into a fight, something the report described as “common among Maldivians who frequent nightclubs in Lanka”. While it mentioned several other Maldivians who were at the club, the celebrities remained the focus of the report.

Confirming that they are looking into the matter, police noted that they have not launched an investigation into the matter but will do so if it is required. Speaking to Minivan News, a police media official said that no one had lodged a complaint concerning the issue yet. However, since it has come to their attention they will now be looking in to the matter.

According to the report, mvyouth has evidence to back all its allegations. Confirming this, the website’s editor Musharraf Hassan said Mvyouth is fully prepared to defend themselves in court if they are to face defamation charges.

He said that a lot of Maldivians engage in such activity in Sri Lanka and mvyouth’s intention was to bring this to the attention of public.

“We want to inform the public on what Maldivians are up to when they are abroad. It is not specific to celebrities, a lot of Maldivians do such things”. Musharraf said.

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Police suspend Upper South Division Commander

The Maldives Police Service has suspended the Upper South Division Commander Inspector Ahmed Shiyam in connection to an ongoing investigation.

The police declined to reveal details of the investigation.

Shiyam was the police media spokesperson for a long period and was later promoted to commander.

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Police completed investigations of sixty four cases last week

Maldives Police Service has said within last week they have completed investigation of 64 cases and asked the Prosecutor General to file charges against 109 people.

Among the cases forwarded to Prosecutor General’s Office were 25 cases related to narcotics, 13 related to theft, 10 assault cases and 9 cases of illicit sexual activity.

In addition, cases concerning bounced cheques, concerning mental and sexual abuse of children , disobeying police orders – two cases of each – were sent.

The police said that the organization is expediting investigations to finish at least eighty percent of cases submitted before 2013 within the first hundred days of President Abdullah Yameen’s government.

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Depiction of Supreme Court Judge in sex-tape remains an uncertainty, says police

The Maldives Police Service has said that it still cannot ascertain that the sex-tapes allegedly depicting Supreme Court Judge Ali Hameed are genuine.

Despite the claims made by police regarding the haziness of the characters seen in the videos, both social media networks and local media have pointed the finger at Judge Hameed when reporting on the videos.

The accusations towards Hameed were supported by an earlier film – apparently taken in the same hotel room as that of the sex videos – in which he was seen discussing the ‘politicization of the Maldivian judiciary’ with a local businessman whom the media identified as Mohamed ‘Golden Lane’ Saeed.

During a press conference held by the police yesterday (December 4) evening, Superintendent Abdulla Nawaz told the press that the police have put huge efforts in identifying the characters seen in the video by utilizing on several forensic tests.

However Nawaz admitted that efforts had not been fruitful in determining the participants, let alone whether it was Hameed seen fornicating with multiple foreign women inside the hotel room.

“Nevertheless, some work regarding the investigation of this case is still proceeding. Also, we would like to inform that work will be done in the future to ensure the investigation leads to success,” Nawaz told the press.

The Superintendent also said that the police had sought “assistance from a country” – that had some relevance to the case – in the investigation process and that it was awaiting reception of some key information regarding the videos that would prove central to their investigations.

“We believe once we get this information [from abroad], more doors will be opened and more clues to the case will be revealed, to enhance our investigations,” Nawaz said.

Although Nawaz did not mention the name of the country, nor what part of the investigation in which assistance had been sought, it has been reported that the video-footage showed a hotel room in Cinnamon Grand Hotel located in Colombo, Sri Lanka.

Given the large number of Maldivians traveling to Sri Lanka, it has been widely speculated that many get involved in prostitution and gambling.

Police determined to prosecute

Last August, a photograph leaked on social media showed the former Deputy Minister of Transport Ibrahim Nazim inside a casino playing roulette. The photograph clearly showed a television screen behind Nazim displaying the words “welcome to Bellagio”, suggesting the location to have been one of the Bellagio franchise casinos in Colombo.

Meanwhile, Nawaz said that the case primarily involved two criminal offences. The first offence was fornication – which under the Maldivian penal law is punishable by 100 lashes and banishment. The second was the use of video for blackmail.

Last June police arrested Ahmed Faiz – a council member of former President Dr Mohamed Waheed’s Gaumee Ihthihaad Party (GIP) and the then-Project Advisor at the Housing Ministry – on  blackmail charges while he was allegedly trying to sell a sex-tape of the judge.

Yesterday, local newspaper Haveeru reported that police had been unable to proceed with the investigations, due to Criminal Court’s failure to provide two key court warrants requested three months ago.

Quoting an official from the Judicial Service Commission – constitutionally mandated to oversee the judiciary – the paper claimed police had sent a letter to the commission informing it of the Criminal Court’s failure to provide the required warrants. Neither the police nor the Criminal Court confirmed the claim.

However, Nawaz implicitly denied Haveeru’s account, telling the press yesterday that police had not come across major barriers in proceeding with the investigations. He maintained that in an investigative perspective the enhancement and analysis of video and audio never was an easy thing to do.

He also reiterated that the police were committed and determined to ensuring the investigation still succeeds, and that they wished to successfully prosecute all those involved in the videos as soon as possible.

Although fornication and adultery remains a criminal offence under the Maldivian law, a successful conviction only arises from either a confession or evidence given by four male eyewitnesses, as prescribed under Islamic Sharia’.

Videos and photographs will only amount to circumstantial evidence and would not suffice a conviction.

Subsequently, regardless of the public circulation of the videos, all parties seen in the video will remain ‘innocent unless proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt’, as per the article 51(h) of the constitution.

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