PUTRAJAYA: The Court of Appeal today reprimanded a woman who is appealing against an eight-year jail term for maid abuse for taking medical leave just before her case is to be heard.
Judge Kamaludin Md Said said it was on record that Rozita Mohd Ali’s case was postponed four times since Sept 24 last year.
“We don’t mind if it was once or twice, but she has taken medical leave just before the appeal is to be heard,” said Kamaludin, who sat Azizah Nawawi and Ahmad Nasfi Yassin.
He said this would be the last adjournment and Roziita, 46, must be present at the next hearing.
“This is the last postponement and there is no more compromise The appeal will go on without her presence,” he said.
Kamaludin also asked Rozita’s sister, Rosliah, who is the bailor, why the appellant did not want to attend court on the scheduled dates.
Rosliah said Rozita did not do it on purpose as she has a history of medical complications. She said there was a medical certificate given by a doctor and this was not a “joke”.
Kamaludin, who raised his voice, then said: “I am asking you because the court wants to knows why she is always absent.
“She can be on the wheelchair if she has knee pain. We have no problem with that.”
He said the court could issue cause to Rosliah and forfeit the RM20,000 bail posted to secure the attendance of Rozita.
The bench then fixed the next hearing for Sept 24.
Earlier, Rozita’s counsel, Mohd Amiraizat Abdul Rani, asked for the matter to be vacated as his client had been admitted to a private hospital in Kuala Lumpur.
However, deputy public prosecutor Ku Hayati Ku Harun said Rozita had been absent from court with the same excuse of suffering from asthma and knee pain.
On May 30, 2018, another Court of Appeal bench allowed Rozita’s application to stay the sentence due to exceptional circumstances.
The bench, however, ordered her to post RM20,000 bail in two sureties and impounded her passport. It also ordered her to report to the Damansara Utama police station once every two weeks.
Rozita filed the application, saying the Shah Alam High Court could not summarily revise her case when the public prosecutor had filed an appeal against the Sessions Court ruling.
Rozita had pleaded guilty on March 15, 2018 to voluntarily causing grievous hurt by dangerous weapons to her Indonesian maid, Suyanti Sutrinso.
Sessions judge Mohammed Mokhzani Mokhtar initially released her on a good behaviour bond for five years with a surety of RM20,000.
However, this sparked outrage among the public, with an online petition against the sentence attracting more than 70,000 signatures.
On revision, judicial commissioner Tun Majid Tun Hamzah ruled on March 29, 2018 that the good behaviour bond imposed by the Sessions Court was incorrect.
Tun Majid said the lower court had wrongly considered the mitigating factor when Suyanti withdrew her police report during the trial.
Rozita has spent two months in Kajang Prison since Tun Majid refused her a stay of execution of the sentence pending appeal.
A video of Suyanti, seriously injured and lying near a drain in a housing area in Mutiara Damansara, went viral in December 2016.
It was reported then that Rozita had allegedly used a kitchen knife, a clothes hanger, a steel mop and an umbrella to cause multiple injuries to Suyanti’s head, hands, legs and internal organs.
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