Identical Twins: The Ultimate Gift for Some Criminal

On August 5, 2003, a pair of twins were arrested by the Malaysian police in charge of trafficking in a huge amount of cannabis and opium. But the confusion began when the policemen could not identify the culprit between the twins.

sometime before the incident happened the Malaysian police somehow came to know that a drug deal was going to happen at a house in Petaling Jaya on Aug 5, 2003. So, the police went to investigate the matter. When they arrived at the place they saw a car near the house and a boy was coming out of the car. So, they went and caught the boy. They noticed two different bags in the car in which about 166,336 gm of cannabis and 1762 gm of raw opium were found. The police started interrogating the boy. Then they noticed there is a key in his hand. Then they found it was his housekey. Then the police along with the man went into the house. And there came the twist. The police discovered another man looking exactly the same as the previous one who had caught red-handed. The policemen were pretty astonished. They were identical twins. The police thought the other one was also involved in this. So, they arrested both of them.

Sathish Raj and Sabrish Raj were under the custody of the Kualalumpur police. The police interrogated them and they had nothing much to do because they had been caught red-handed. The police believed that both of them were involved in this drug deal. So, the police prepared their case according to the evidence they had got.

Some days later the case was referred to the court. And here the travel began. According to the court, the most important parameter to judgement is the evidence, the testimony. The more the case progressed, the more complicated it became. Unfortunately, the police had done a big mistake. In their factum, it was written when and where the incident happened, first they caught one of them with the drugs and then caught the second one in the house. But they had not put forward any identification mark that distinguished between the two. So, on the date of the case proceedings, when the advocate asked the police officer to identify the one who had caught with drugs, they couldn't differentiate between those two. The police couldn't found a single way to identify the culprit. They became too confused. who was caught in the car? who was caught in the house? who had the key in his hand? who was caught later? They had no clue. The twins looked so similar. In the court, one of the twins was wearing glasses. So, at first, the policemen called him the culprit. But when the record was checked, the court found that none of those twins was wearing glasses at the time of their arrest. At last, that he couldn't determine which one is the culprit. So, the case was becoming more difficult.

A DNA test can differentiate between two people. But as they are identical twins, their DNA was also identical. So, this idea was also futile. And here advocate present a factum that if one twin was caught with the drugs it didn't mean that the other one was also involved in it just because they lived in the same house. The court accepted the fact that maybe one twin was innocent and another one was a drug peddler. But the question was, who was innocent? and who was guilty? Dates after dates were given to the police to find some clue. But they could not find one. Some people say police used to lock them in a room for hours for only this purpose that they would speak about themselves. But the bond between them is unmatchable. They didn't utter a word against each other. Whenever they were asked, they both said they had no connection with drugs, they are innocent. Police knew that one of them is lying but who?

Five years had passed, there was no evidence of the boy from whom the bag was found?

Eventually, the Malaysian high court had come to a judgement. The law on drugs was very strict in Malaysia. If someone was found with more than a fixed amount(which was very little), the punishment was death. More than 200 people were given the death penalty for drug trafficking. And in this case, the culprit was found with over a hundred kilos of drugs, so it was fixed that they were going to be hanged.

Finally , he judgement day had arrived. Both twins were clad in white shirt on this day in the court. They are looking just a mirror reflection of each other.

The then justice Zaharah Ibrahim described it as a very unique case, and observed, "The brothers look alike and have identical DNA which makes it difficult to differentiate between them, but there is no doubt that one of them is the culprit." She ruled, " Because of the twins' identical features had made it impossible for the officers' testifying to point out which one had been found with the key, she had no choice but to acquit both of them " and said, "I can't be sending the wrong person to the gallows."

After Zaharah had delivered her judgement, the twins cried and hugged each other.