‘Get tough with errant drivers’

Ex-CJ: Courts must impose harshest penalty on those who cause fatal accidents

PORT DICKSON: The courts should impose the harshest penalty on drivers responsible for causing deaths in accidents, says former Chief Justice Tun Zaki Azmi.

He added the courts should take such cases very seriously and invoke the law to its fullest extent.

He said legislators are compelled to seek the maximum penalty from the courts.

“But in practice, the courts generally don’t. They treat traffic offences very lightly, and I am not talking about parking offences.

“When it comes to dangerous driving, there should be an even heavier penalty,” Zaki told The Star yesterday.

He was commenting on a fatal accident near the Menora Tunnel in Perak on the North-South Expressway on Saturday when a trailer driver lost control of his truck and collided into several vehicles, caus- ing a car to burst into flames and killing a family of five.

The 41-year-old trailer driver, who is in police custody, had 28 traffic-related summonses under his name. He was tested positive for methamphetamine.

Under the Road Transport Act, offenders, if found guilty, can be jailed for two to 10 years and fined between RM5,000 and RM20,000.

Zaki said sometimes, the courts tend to impose imprisonment sentences concurrently.

“If a person goes into a house, steals three times, those are three separate offences, technically speaking. But it’s (considered) as one break-in.

“So, in those sort of cases, you give concurrent (sentencing). But if you commit one snatch theft today, another tomorrow and the day after, and you are caught and charged for those offences, how can it be concurrent?” he asked.

Zaki felt that some magistrates tend to give concurrent sentences to offenders.

“I want to remind magistrates and the public that one of these days, it could happen to a close member of your family, they could become a victim.

“When I was Chief Justice, I always told the magistrates... to catch these offenders, it is difficult.

“Punishment is not just to deter these people, but more towards deterring others from committing and getting away with such crimes,” Zaki added.

On Monday, Transport Minister Anthony Loke said that the Road Transport Act needed to be amended to ensure that drivers responsible for causing deaths are banned from driving for life.

Loke said that Section 41 of the Act states that a driver guilty of causing death by reckless driving cannot hold or obtain a driving licence for at least three years.

He added that such punishment is not strict enough.

Loke also noted that the amendment to the Act would take some time as it needed to be studied and brought to the Attorney General’s Chambers before being tabled in Parliament.

“We also need to gather feedback from agencies such as Miros (Malaysian Institute of Road Safety Research),” he said.

I want to remind magistrates and the public that one of these days, it could happen to a close member of your family, they could become a victim. Tun Zaki Azmi