KUALA LUMPUR: The High Court has fixed Oct 16 to hear an application for judicial review brought by the family of Teoh Beng Hock against the police over his death in 2009.
Federal counsel Sallehudin Ali said the date was fixed after case management before Justice Wan Ahmad Farid Wan Salleh.
He said the judge ordered that parties file their written submission by Aug 29 and reply, if any, by Sept 29.
The High Court had on June 16 last year granted the family leave to file for judicial review, six months after the application was filed.
Beng Hock’s father, Teoh Leong Hwee, 75, and mother, Teng Shuw Hoi, 70, are seeking a court order to compel the inspector-general of police (IGP) to carry out a complete investigation into their son’s death.
The government, the IGP and the Bukit Aman criminal investigation department (CID) director were named as respondents in the application.
The couple is also seeking several declarations, including one that states the police were negligent for failing to complete the probe within a reasonable time.
Teng, in her affidavit, said the police had failed to investigate Beng Hock’s death despite the Court of Appeal ruling in the family’s favour in 2014.
She said the police had formed three separate task forces – in 2011, 2014, and 2018 – supposedly to investigate the death and last provided information in 2021.
In 2014, a three-member Court of Appeal bench ruled that Beng Hock’s death was caused by the act of “a person or persons unknown”, including Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) officers who had questioned him overnight before he was found dead.
The High Court had also recorded an out-of-court settlement, in which the family was awarded RM600,000 in damages for negligence.
Beng Hock, the then political aide to Selangor executive councillor and DAP’s Seri Kembangan assemblyman Ean Yong Hian Wah, was found dead on the fifth-floor service corridor of Plaza Masalam in Shah Alam on July 16, 2009.
He had been held there overnight and questioned by MACC, which had its Selangor headquarters on the 14th floor of the building.
An RCI in 2011 determined that Beng Hock had been driven to suicide by MACC’s aggressive questioning.