The widow of Cradle Fund Sdn Bhd CEO Nazrin Hassan and two teen boys pleaded not guilty in the Shah Alam High Court today to a charge of murdering him in June last year.

Samirah Muzaffar, 44, a former senior executive at Intellectual Property Corporation of Malaysia (MyIPO), and the two boys, aged 13 and 16, entered the plea after the charge was read out separately to them before judge Ab Karim Ab Rahman.

Samirah, the two teenagers and Indonesian national Eka Wahyu Lestari, who is still at large, were charged with the murder of the 47-year-old Nazrin at a house in Mutiara Homes, between 11.30pm on June 13, 2018, and 4am the following day.

The charge, under Section 302 of the Penal Code and read together with Section 34, provides for the mandatory death sentence upon conviction.

The court fixed April 11 for case management.

Samirah, clad in a black baju kurung and grey scarf, arrived at the court together with the two teens at 8.30am and was greeted by family members and friends, who sat at the public gallery.

Also present was political analyst and social activist Dr Chandra Muzaffar.

During the proceedings, deputy public prosecutor Mohd Zain Ibrahim informed the court that statements of 75 witnesses had been recorded, but the prosecution had yet to determine the number of those who will be called to testify.

“We are not offering bail to all the accused, and we will protest should they apply for bail,” he said.

Lawyer Muhammad Shafee Abdullah, representing Samirah (above), informed the court that he would file a bail application for his client on another date.

He also lodged a complaint that his client had been placed in a separate dark room at the Kajang Prison, and was not given a pencil and notebook to make notes on the case.

“We hope the deputy public prosecutor will look into this matter. This is the first time I am hearing such a thing happening at the Kajang Prison. 

"My client was only released from the room after the complaint was lodged,” he said.

Zain replied that the prosecution would notify the prison authorities to ensure that the accused is accorded her rights.

Request for transfer denied

Meanwhile, the lawyer representing the two teenagers, Hisyam Teh, filed a complaint to the court that his 16-year-old client, who is currently being placed at the Sentosa Probation Hostel in Sentul, had been physically and sexually assaulted.

Read more: Cops to probe assault claim of teen accused of Cradle CEO murder

As such he appealed that his client be transferred to the Puncak Alam Corrective School, at which his 13-year-old client was being detained.

Deputy public prosecutor Jamil Aripin, however, objected to the application on the grounds that the two teenagers had been segregated according to age.

The judge said that he could not issue instructions based solely on the complaint, and requested Hisham to officially submit his application.

The court in the meantime upheld the gag order issued earlier by the Petaling Jaya Magistrate's Court on the media, not to publish the names, photographs and other details that could expose the identities of the minors in any electronic or print media platform.

The Petaling Jaya Magistrate's Court had on Oct 1, 2018, allowed the police to exhume Nazrin’s remains for a second postmortem to assist the police investigation into his death.

On Aug 3 last year, Nazrin's death was reclassified as murder after an investigation by the Fire and Rescue Department found traces of petrol at the scene of the fire.

It was initially reported that Nazrin had died in a fire caused by an explosion of his mobile phone.

The second autopsy report stated that Nazrin died from head injuries and not from the cell phone explosion.

- Bernama