Yang Yang & Ors v Public Prosecutor

Applicant(s):

• Yang Yang
• Rio Antoni
• Billy Hariyanto
• Xxxx
• Edy Tjong
• Pornchai Kaewsapsak

Respondent(s): Pendakwa Raya

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

• Two sets of foreign national appellants, jointly charged with Malaysian co-accused under s 12(2) of the Dangerous Drugs Act 1952, filed separate stand-alone applications before the Court of Appeal seeking bail pending trial in the Magistrates' Court.
• In one application, bail had been refused by the Magistrates' Court and a subsequent criminal revision to the High Court was administratively dismissed; in the other, bail initially granted by the Magistrates' Court had been withdrawn by the High Court in respect of the foreign accused only.
• The two applications were heard together as they raised a common jurisdictional question as to whether the Court of Appeal could entertain a stand-alone bail application in the absence of any pending appeal.

• Whether the Court of Appeal, being a creature of statute under Article 121(1B) of the Federal Constitution and s 50 of the Courts of Judicature Act 1964, possesses jurisdiction to entertain a stand-alone bail application where there is no pending appeal and no appealable order of the High Court.
• Whether rr 72(4), 76 and 105 of the Rules of the Court of Appeal 1994 are merely procedural and incapable of conferring substantive jurisdiction, particularly given the definition of "Judge" in r 2 as confined to a Judge of the Court of Appeal.
• Whether entertaining such applications amounts to an abuse of process in the absence of a conventional appellate proceeding.

• The Court held that since a refusal of bail is interlocutory and not an appealable decision (following Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim and Samat bin Yamin), the absence of a pending appeal cannot be fatal to jurisdiction, as this would create a procedural vacuum immune from judicial reconsideration of an order affecting liberty.
• Applying the binding Federal Court authority in Samat bin Yamin (on materially analogous Rules of the Federal Court), the Court held that rr 72(4), 76 and 105 of the RCOA, together with the Court's inherent jurisdiction to prevent injustice, provide the procedural machinery—though not the source—for exercising jurisdiction over stand-alone bail applications; the preliminary objection was accordingly dismissed.
• Following the Respondent's concession on the merits, the Court did not determine the contested issues of flight risk or suitability of sureties, and allowed both applications, granting bail to all appellants on standard terms including cash bail, Malaysian sureties, surrender of passports, and periodic police reporting.