Public Prosecutor v Gan Lim Soon

• Judge: Yong Pung How CJ
• Judgment Date: 26 May 1993
• Neutral Citation: [1993] SGHC 119
• Citation: [1993] SGHC 119
• Defendant Counsel: Lim Choon Mong (Lim & Lim)
• Docket Number: Magistrate's Appeal No 429 of 1992
• Plaintiff Counsel: Palaniappan Sundararaj (Deputy Public Prosecutor)
• Published date: 19 September 2003
• Date: 26 May 1993
• Court: High Court (Singapore)
• Subject Matter: Bus colliding with pedestrian at pedestrian crossing,case,Trials,Criminal Procedure and Sentencing,s 304A Penal Code (Cap 224),No question that pedestrian had right of way,Prosecution,Case proved beyond reasonable doubt by default,Criminal Law,Offences,Accused choosing to remain silent when called upon to enter upon his defence,rr 5 & 7 Pedestrian Crossing Rules 1982,Culpable homicide,Prima facie case,Hard evidence constituting prima facie case established at close of prosecution,Causing death by negligent act

The respondent was originally charged in the district court under s 304A of the Penal Code (Cap 224) with causing the death on 14 February 1989 of a pedestrian by doing a negligent act not amounting to culpable homicide by failing to give way to a pedestrian while making a left turn in his bus and colliding into the pedestrian who was crossing on a pedestrian crossing while the green man lights were on, thus causing her death.

At the conclusion of the prosecution`s evidence on 19 March 1992 defence counsel submitted that there was no case to answer and the district judge acquitted the respondent without calling on his defence. The public prosecutor appealed and, at the conclusion of the appeal on 3 September 1992, I sent the case back to the district judge to call on the respondent to enter upon his defence.

The principles on which a court should decide at the closing of the prosecution`s case whether there is a case for the accused to answer have been set out by the Privy Council in Haw Tua Tau v PP . Although these principles are not without their problems in implementation, they have been followed by the courts in Singapore ever since. What these principles mean is that if the judge comes to the conclusion after hearing the prosecution`s evidence that there is evidence (not inherently incredible) which constitutes a prima facie case which the accused should be called upon to answer, he must call upon the accused to enter upon his defence. Of course, the accused might choose not to give evidence or call witnesses, and it is then left to the judge to assess the credibility of the witnesses and to decide in a case of conflict which of them he finds to be the more credible, before deciding whether the case is proved beyond reasonable doubt.

However, there is one qualification to this. If, apart from the disputed facts and the credibility of the witnesses, there is hard evidence, whether in the shape of documents or photographs or what are known as `silent facts`, which is itself sufficient to constitute a prima facie case on the charge, the accused cannot choose to remain silent when called upon. If he does remain silent, the unavoidable result is that the case would then have been effectively proved against him beyond reasonable doubt by default.

In the present case, when the respondent was called upon in the district court on 27 October 1992 to enter upon his defence, he elected to remain silent and offered no witnesses. After submissions,...