Railway head’s wives deny additional charge

KOTA KINABALU: The two wives of the State Railway Department public engineering head yesterday claimed trial to an additional money laundering charge at the Sessions Court here.

Runtiah Rais, 42, and Muhilim @ Masniah Buaya, 58, pleaded not guilty before judge Abu Bakar Manat to separate charges under Section 4 (1)(b) of the Anti-Money Laundering, and Anti-Terrorism Financing and Proceeds of Unlawful Activities (Amlafatpua) Act 2001.

The charges carry a jail term of not exceeding 15 years and shall also be liable to a fine of not less than five times the sum or value of the proceeds of an unlawful activity or instrumentalities of an offence at the time the offence was committed, or RM5 million, whichever is the higher, upon conviction.

Runtiah was alleged to have received RM39,100 cash, which were proceeds of an unlawful activity, in her Amanah Saham Bumiputera account between October 2011 and October 2017 at a bank at Lorong Kemajuan Karamunsing here.

Meanwhile Muhilim was alleged to have possessed RM356,078.52 cash, the proceeds of an unlawful activity, in her Amanah Saham Bumiputera account on April 17 at a bank along Jalan Perpaduan, Kampung Air, here.

Earlier, deputy public prosecutor from the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission, Rozanna Abdul Hadi, applied for the present case to be consolidated with their previous case of money laundering.

As for bail, she applied for the bail amount to be imposed as the same as the previous bail at RM50,000 in a local surety.

Counsel Sugumar Balakrishnan, who represented both accused, however, objected to a fresh bail and requested for the previous bail to be maintained.

The court fixed June 19 for pretrial case management and their bail to be maintained from previous cases.

In the previous case, both accused were charged together with their husband on April 22, where they claimed trial to a numbers of separate and joint charges of money laundering involving RM2,199,739.

Ismail Ahmad, 59, and his spouses Muhilim and Runtiah, face 13, six and nine charges respectively, all under the Amlafatpua Act 2001.

Ismail was released on bail of RM100,000 with RM50,000 to be deposited while his wives were granted RM50,000 bail each, for all their charges, with one local surety each of the accused persons.