ABOUT two weeks before Tengku Teh Susilawati Tengku Akhirat’s death, she left home after telling her family her life was in danger following threats she had received from a person she did not reveal.
She kept in touch with them daily while away until May 6, 2005 when they no longer heard from the 20-year-old.
In the evening of that fateful day, her body was found inside a large TV cardboard box by a road shoulder in Section 12 in Petaling Jaya, a stone’s throw away from the University Malaya Medical Centre (UMMC).
Two UMMC staff, who spotted the box and decided to check on it, were startled to find the victim’s petite body in a foetal position inside and called the police.
As there were no identification papers on her, police traced her family following a thumbprint identification.
A post-mortem revealed that she had been killed via strangulation and suffocation at least 12 hours earlier.
Over the next few days, two friends of the victim were held to assist in the probe.
A week later, a policeman from the Subang Jaya district police headquarters, then aged 49, was arrested.
He was tracked down after his fingerprints were found on the cellophane tape that was used to seal the box the body was found in.
Investigations showed the policeman, who is a father of five, had an affair with the victim.
Jealousy had led to their relationship souring months earlier.
A DNA analysis on samples of hair and seminal fluids retrieved from the victim’s body had also matched clinical samples taken from the policeman.
More than three weeks after the body has found, Lance Corporal Abdul Halim Hasan, a police crime scene photographer, was charged with Tengku Teh’s murder.
He was accused of committing the crime at a bus stop near the Kelana Jaya LRT station several hours before the victim’s body was found.
Abdul Halim claimed trial and the court heard from the victim’s family that prior to her death, Tengku Teh had left three jobs in two months as a restaurant cashier, a company clerk and petrol station staff.
In August 2009, Abdul Halim, who had served the police force for over 25 years, was sentenced to seven years in jail for culpable homicide.
The High Court ordered that the sentence be served from the date of arrest.
There were outcry from several women and human rights’ groups that claimed that the sentence that Abdul Hamid received was too light.
