SMIT’S KIN SEEK REVISION OF VERDICT
They want coroner’s finding of ‘misadventure’ revised to homicide or unlawful killing
THE family of Dutch model Ivana Esther Robert Smit has filed an application seeking a revision of the verdict of the Coroner’s Court, which declared her death in 2017 a misadventure.
The family’s counsel, S.N. Nair, said the application was filed with the deputy registrar of the High Court here at 4.15pm yesterday under Section 323 of the Criminal Procedure Code.
The family is contending that, while the coroner had rightly accepted their contention that Smit’s death should not have been ruled as having no foul play involved, there were several grounds for revision.
These included the investigating officer’s “incompetence and lack of credibility” in not opening an investigation paper (IP) and treating it as suicide despite there being “overwhelming evidence” to the contrary.
The family also contends that the Kuala Lumpur Hospital pathologist had been incompetent in making “damning assumptions” of suicide without being present at the scene.
They also contend that the foreign couple — American businessman Alex Johnson, 44, and his Kazakh wife, Luna, 31 — who were last seen with Smit had not been interrogated in depth and should have been made suspects of a homicide, giving them an opportunity to flee Malaysia, and that despite being subpoenaed to appear during the inquest, had not done so, giving rise to “amputations of some level of culpability”.
The family maintains there should be a revision as the coroner had agreed with the findings of Dutch pathologist Dr Frank Van Der Gutter that Smit had died of hypothermia and trauma to the back of her head before the fall and that she had grab marks and Johnson’s DNA under her fingernails.
Finally, the family contends that while the coroner had been in full concurrence with their counsel’s submissions, she had come to the wrong conclusion when she declared Smit’s death a misadventure.
The family is of the opinion that the findings from the body of evidence should have led the coro- ner to declare the death a homicide or unlawful killing.
“Normally, the High Court judge will call upon us as solicitors and the DPP (deputy public prosecutor) to present arguments either in writing or by oral submissions or both at a date to be determined by the court, which may take one or two months,” Nair said.