Azmel Maamor of the Federal Court , Ayer Molek ,and VK Lingam

The Ayer Molek Case:

April 10, 1995: High Court Judge Datuk Azmel Maamor (now a Federal Court judge) ordered Ayer Molek Rubber Co Bhd to register and transfer 540,000 ordinary shares to Insas Bhd. Datuk V. Kanagalingam (also known as V.K. Lingam) appeared for Insas.

April 18, 1995: Ayer Molek files an appeal against the High Court's order

July 26, 1995: Ayer Molek appealed at the Court of Appeal. The appellate court said "it was using its inherent power to stop further injustices from being perpetrated".

In a stinging judgment delivered on July 31(1995), Justice Datuk N.H. Chan, sitting with Justice Datuk Siti Norma Yaakob and Justice Datuk K.C. Vohrah, began: "This is a case about an injustice that's been perpetrated by a court of law and . . . a case about abuse of the process by the High Court.... Here the plaintiffs through their legal advisers have abused the process of the High Court by instigating the injustice through misuse of the court's procedure by manipulating it in such a way that it becomes manifestly unfair to the defendants. By doing what they did, these unethical lawyers have brought the administration of justice into disrepute."

Said Chan: "While . . . it does not render the proceedings to be in any way invalid, it may . . . give the impression to right thinking people that litigants can choose the judge before whom they wish to appear."
In conclusion, Chan quoted from Shakespeare's Hamlet. "These observations are made so that people will not say: 'Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.'"


Aug 12, 1995: Federal Court overturned the Court of Appeal's judgment and censured the lower court for its comments.

(Sources http://www.malaysianbar.org.my/content/view/4239/2/ and S. Jayasankaran ;Courting Concerns: Recent cases raise questions about legal system ; Far Eastern Economic Review,7 September 1995)


1 SEPTEMBER 2006:
Dato' Mohd Hishamudin Bin Yunus J, handing down judgment in DATO' V. KANAGALINGAM v. DAVID SAMUELS, JOFF WILD, ROBERT MENZIES WALKER & EUROMONEY PUBLICATIONS PLC:
I have dismissed the plaintiff’s claim....My grounds are as follows...there is a common law principle established as early as 1775 that a person cannot bring an action based on his own wrong (ex turpi causa non oritur action)......That the plaintiff is guilty of wrongdoings, namely, abusing and manipulating the process of court so as to cause injustice to the defendants before the High Court in the Ayer Molek case is clear from the judgment of the Court of Appeal in the case, which is the main subject of the article, as reported in Ayer Molek Rubber Co Bhd & Ors v Insas Bhd & Anor [1995] 2 MLJ 734. The judgment of the Court of Appeal is referred to by the plaintiff in his evidence. It is the plaintiff’s own wrongful conduct in the Ayer Molek’s case that led to the publication of the article.(http://www.malaysianbar.org.my/content/view/4301/27/)