Darnesh a/l Rajendran v Pendakwa Raya

Appellant(s): Darnesh A/L Rajendran

Respondent(s): Pendakwa Raya

• YA Datuk Noorin binti Badaruddin
• YA Datuk Mohd Radzi Bin Abdul Hamid
• YA Datuk Meor Hashimi bin Abdul Hamid

• The appellant was charged with murder under section 302 of the Penal Code for fatally stabbing the deceased outside a pub following an altercation that began inside the premises over an accidental collision while dancing.
• Three eyewitnesses testified that they saw the appellant stab the deceased once in the chest with a knife, and forensic evidence confirmed the cause of death was a single stab wound that penetrated the heart and caused near-instantaneous death.
• The appellant's defence was a bare denial, claiming he did not carry or use a knife and that the deceased was stabbed by an unidentified individual from another group involved in a separate scuffle; the trial judge rejected this defence, convicted the appellant, and sentenced him to 30 years' imprisonment and 12 strokes of whipping, prompting cross-appeals by both the appellant (against conviction and sentence) and the Public Prosecutor (against sentence).

• Whether minor discrepancies among the three eyewitnesses (as to the exact location of the stabbing and the type of knife used) were material enough to undermine their credibility and render the conviction unsafe.
• Whether Exception 4 to section 300 of the Penal Code (sudden fight without premeditation) applied to reduce the conviction from murder to culpable homicide not amounting to murder under section 304(b).
• Whether the prosecution's failure to produce CCTV footage of the incident, and whether the injuries were merely "potentially fatal" rather than definitively fatal, undermined the prosecution's case under section 300(c) of the Penal Code.

• The Court held that discrepancies among eyewitnesses as to peripheral details (exact location, precise type of knife) were not material and did not detract from their consistent, credible identification of the appellant as the person who stabbed the deceased, applying established authority that minor inconsistencies are natural and do not destroy credibility.
• The Court rejected the applicability of Exception 4 to section 300, finding no evidence of a sudden, unpremeditated fight; instead, the evidence showed the quarrel began inside the pub and continued outside, where the appellant deliberately stabbed the deceased, and the fatal nature of the single stab wound to the heart satisfied section 300(c).
• The Court dismissed both the appellant's appeal against conviction and sentence, and the Public Prosecutor's appeal against sentence, affirming the High Court's conviction under section 302 and the sentence of 30 years' imprisonment and 12 strokes of whipping as appropriate and proportionate.