Court rejects defense witnesses presented by SC Justices and ex-president Gayoom

Presiding Judge over the trials of former President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, Supreme Court (SC) Chief Justice Abdulla Saeed and Justice Ali Hameed has decided not to accept witness statements from any presented in the charges raised against the trio for obstruction of justice, on Sunday night.

Judge Hassan Najeeb said that witness statements will not be accepted from the SC justices defense, after all statements had been taken from witnesses at the hearing held on Tuesday night.

The judge had made the decision after looking into the testimonies presented by the state.

While Gayoom had not presented any defense witnesses in the hearing, Saeed had presented former Judicial Administer Hassan Saeed and senior employee at the Supreme Court’s protocol department Athika Ibrahim. Hameed has presented his wife Fathmath Nasira, former Judicial Administrator Hassan Saeed and along with Hashma Hassan. Although Hameed had given his wife’s name as a witness, he had later withdrawn her name.

In the hearing held on Sunday night, two officers of the Maldives Police Service (MPS) were presented as witnesses against Saeed, two against Gayoom and a witness who had given a secret testimony against Hameed.

Giving their testimonies against the SC Justices, two officers of MPS Ismail Wildhan and Mohamed Samih who had been there on the night of their arrest, said that both justices had been arrested while they were inside a compartment on the second floor of the SC on the night of 05th February. Both officers had said that the justices had refused to hand over their phones upon police order to do so, and they had not found their phones upon searching the entire SC building. Evidently both justices had said that they did not have their phone on them when the police had asked for it after revealing the accusations for which they were being arrested.

Mohamed Latheef and Hussain Azmeel, officers of MPS who was involved in Gayoom’s arrest, said in his testimony that after taking Gayoom into police custody, they had ordered him to handover his phone to which Gayoom had responded that he did not have it on him at the time, and had requested to check if his daughter Dunya Maumoon or wife Nasreena Ibrahim had it.

However, Latheef had added that neither Dunya nor Nasreena had a hold of Gayoom’s phone.

Both officers had said that they had not found Gayoom’s phone upon searching the entirety of his residence, Endherimaage.

The secret testimony given by a witness in the hearing states that the witness had met Hameed on various occasions and spoke to him on the phone as well, however, Hameed had not given the witness anything related to the case lodged against him at court.

Gayoom had noted the use of secret testimonies in the hearing, having asserted that secret testimonies are not permitted in the religion.

Judge Najeeb said that the next hearing in the trial of the trio will be held for a summary statement in the case. Najeeb announced that the hearing is scheduled for 11:00 a.m on Tuesday.