Roszaidi bin Osman v PP
| Jurisdiction | Singapore |
| Judge | Sundaresh Menon CJ,Andrew Phang Boon Leong JCA,Judith Prakash JCA,Steven Chong JCA,Belinda Ang Saw Ean JCA |
| Judgment Date | 01 December 2022 |
| Docket Number | Criminal Appeal No 2 of 2019 |
| Court | Court of Appeal (Singapore) |
Sundaresh Menon CJ, Andrew Phang Boon Leong JCA, Judith Prakash JCA, Steven Chong JCA and Belinda Ang Saw Ean JCA
Criminal Appeal No 2 of 2019
Court of Appeal
Criminal Law — Special exceptions — Diminished responsibility — Accused person sentenced to mandatory death penalty seeking to be re-sentenced to life imprisonment — Whether accused person eligible for alternative sentencing regime — Section 33B(1)(b) Misuse of Drugs Act (Cap 185, 2008 Rev Ed)
Criminal Law — Special exceptions — Diminished responsibility — Accused person suffering from major depressive disorder and substance use disorder — Accused person obtaining supply of drugs for own consumption from drug trafficking activities — Accused person handing drugs to wife instead of completing delivery — Whether accused person's abnormalities of mind substantially impaired his mental responsibility for his decision to traffic drugs and for his specific act of giving drugs to his wife — Section 33B(3)(b) Misuse of Drugs Act (Cap 185, 2008 Rev Ed)
Criminal Law — Special exceptions — Diminished responsibility — Accused person suffering from major depressive disorder and substance use disorder — Whether accused person's major depressive disorder and substance use disorder operated together in synergistic manner — Whether accused person's abnormalities of mind arose from inherent cause — Section 33B(3)(b) Misuse of Drugs Act (Cap 185, 2008 Rev Ed)
Held, allowing the appeal (Andrew Phang Boon Leong JCA and Steven Chong JCA dissenting):
Per Sundaresh Menon CJ, Judith Prakash JCA and Belinda Ang Saw Ean JCA:
General observations on the expert evidence
(1) The evidence of the Prosecution's expert, Dr Bharat Saluja (“Dr Saluja”), had serious shortcomings and consequently limited utility in assisting the court with answering the questions before it. Dr Saluja's first report (“Dr Saluja's 1st Report”) was prepared long before the issue of re-sentencing under s 33B(1)(b) of the MDA was raised, and was directed at addressing a different set of issues from those relevant to s 33B(3)(b). In his second to fifth reports, Dr Saluja added little of value to his initial analysis, and essentially maintained his earlier overall assessment that Roszaidi's mental condition had not contributed to his offence, even though the relevant questions and thresholds under s 33B(3)(b) were fundamentally different. These subsequent reports were also lacking in rigour and substantiation: at [48] to [53].
(2) In contrast, the reports of the Defence's expert, Dr Jacob Rajesh (“Dr Rajesh”), were all directed at addressing the limbs of the Nagaenthran test. Moreover, although his interviews with Roszaidi took place four years after the offence, they had the advantage of being targeted at addressing the remitted questions: at [54].
The Second Limb of the Nagaenthran test
(3) The primary concern underlying the restrictive reading of the aetiologies prescribed in the Second Limb was the need to limit the application of s 33B(3)(b) of the MDA to accused persons suffering from recognised and established psychiatric conditions, and to exclude abnormalities of the mind that arose from other sources (such as heightened states of emotion or intoxication) that were not beyond the accused person's control: at [60].
(4) The Second Limb was satisfied by Roszaidi's MDD and his SUD operating together in a synergistic manner at the material time (ie, the Synergy Claim). Roszaidi's MDD formed the underlying substrate for his SUD, such that it accounted for the intensity at which his SUD operated at the time of the offence. As Roszaidi's MDD and SUD were inextricably intertwined at the material time, it would have been impractical and artificial to attempt to ascertain the aetiology of his SUD in isolation from his MDD. Given that it was undisputed that Roszaidi's MDD arose from an inherent cause, it followed that Roszaidi's SUD also arose from an inherent cause: at [78] and [79].
(5) In these circumstances, it was unnecessary to address the question of whether SUD per se could satisfy the Second Limb, which was left open: at [81].
The Third Limb of the Nagaenthran test
(6) Given that the Second Limb was satisfied by Roszaidi's MDD and SUD operating together, the question that arose for determination under the Third Limb was whether the combination of Roszaidi's MDD and his SUD substantially impaired his mental responsibility for his acts in relation to his offence at the material time: at [82].
The applicable principles
(7) Although the concept of diminished responsibility operated in a functionally similar way both in the context of s 33B of the MDA and as a partial defence to murder in Exception 7 to s 300 of the Penal Code 1871 (2020 Rev Ed) (the “Penal Code”), there would be a subtle but important difference of emphasis in the application of the relevant principles, stemming from the nature of the relevant offences. In the context of s 33B, the court had to pay particular attention to what influenced the accused person's prior decision to commit the offence (as distinct from the execution of the offence), and whether this decision was itself a product of the accused person's decision-making faculties being substantially impaired. This might be especially important where the underlying abnormality of mind in issue was of such a nature as to distort the accused person's ability to make decisions: at [84(a)], [94], [96] and [100].
(8) It was essential to have regard to the role of the accused person's abnormalities of mind not only in relation to the specific acts constituting the primary offence with which he was charged, but also in relation to the broader question of what led him to carry out those acts and to commit that offence: at [84(b)].
(9) The accused person's abnormality of mind did not need to be the cause of his offending. Instead, the question was whether the abnormality of mind had an influence on his commission of the relevant acts: at [104].
(10) There were at least three specific aspects of mental responsibility that were typically relevant under s 33B(3)(b) of the MDA: (a) the accused person's capacity to perceive his acts or omissions and know their nature (“basic cognitive ability”); (b) his capacity to know and appreciate whether those acts or omissions were wrong, in the sense of being both contrary to the ordinary standards of reasonable and honest persons and contrary to law (“moral and legal cognition”); and (c) his ability to exercise his will to control his actions such that he acted in accordance with what he knew to be right or wrong (“control”). It was only necessary for an accused person to establish a substantial impairment in respect of any one of these aspects: at [105] and [122].
(11) As for the meaning of “substantial”, the relevant impairment of mental responsibility had to be real and material, as opposed to trivial or minimal. It did not need to be total, nor did it need to rise to the level of unsoundness of mind in s 84 of the Penal Code or to the level of automatism. While an accused person's inability to exercise willpower to control his physical acts would suffice, his difficulty in doing so might suffice depending on the degree of difficulty faced. The test ultimately ought to be whether his ability to resist doing what he did was sufficiently impaired: at [109] and [111].
(12) Whether or not the Third Limb was satisfied was primarily a question of fact for the court to decide, based on all the evidence before it: at [84(c)] and [103].
(13) In this case, there was no dispute that Roszaidi had basic cognitive ability and moral and legal cognition. It was the aspect of control that was of crucial importance: at [106].
(14) Drawing together the various threads derived from the principles and authorities, the central question before the court should be framed in the following terms: Did Roszaidi's abnormalities of mind have a real and material (as opposed to trivial or minimal) effect or influence on his ability to exercise control over his actions, and specifically to act in accordance with what he knew to be right?: at [112].
(15) While rationality might be relevant to both the second and the third aspects of mental responsibility, it was unhelpful to introduce rationality as a label or touchstone to guide the overall analysis of impairment: at [113].
(a) With regard to moral and legal cognition, the specific inquiry was whether the accused person was able to distinguish right from wrong on an objective (or rational) basis, rather than on a subjective (and likely irrational) basis: at [114].
(b) The relevance of rationality to control was also not straightforward. If the accused person's decision to commit the offence was one in respect of which his mental responsibility was materially and relevantly impaired, such that this decision was in truth the product of a disordered mind which was not functioning rationally in the first place, his seeming rationality while following through with that anterior decision would not necessarily displace the availability of s 33B(3)(b): at [115] and [117].
(16) As framed in the charge against him, Roszaidi's specific act of trafficking was his act of giving the two packets containing the Drugs to Azidah. However, as viewing this specific act in isolation would have artificially ignored the reality of what Roszaidi was in fact doing, it was necessary to consider whether Roszaidi's mental responsibility for both his specific act of giving the Drugs to Azidah and his prior decision to traffic in the Drugs were substantially impaired by his MDD and SUD: at [132].
The expert evidence on the Third Limb
(17) Dr Saluja focused only on the question of whether Roszaidi's mental responsibility was substantially impaired by his MDD. Dr Saluja's opinion on the Synergy Claim having been rejected in the analysis of...
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