Accused had no idea there were 15 Chinese men hidden in the warehouse when they were arrested.

[ASEAN NOW]

 

Three former police officers, two of whom worked for the Immigration Department, told the Phnom Penh Appeal Court Wednesday that they were ignorant that the Ministry of Interior's identification department deputy director Major General Soeu Sitha kept 15 Chinese nationals hidden in a warehouse.

 

Captain Rath Pin, 56, a deputy chief of the Khmer Identity Bureau under Sitha; Lieutenant Colonel Van Sopheap, 56, a legal procedure bureau officer with the Immigration Department; and Major Yin Vengleang, 42, also with the Department, said during their appeal hearing that they only learned about the Chinese nationals when Sitha ordered them to take $50,000 as a bribe to the aforementioned.

 

Pin informed the court that on February 1, 2019, Sitha bought a 500-hectare lease property from a lawyer in Svay Chachib commune, Baset district, Kampong Speu province, to cultivate mango trees.

 

He said that the leased land had been transferred to his name, and that Sitha had hired local farmers to grow mango trees on it, which he visited every weekend except June.

 

He went on to say that Sitha had paid him $50,000 to bribe police officials who had arrested the Chinese nationals in exchange for their release.

 

Police searched the warehouse on July 18 and detained the Chinese nationals, he added, while he was apprehended on July 24.

 

“The Chinese nationals were not hidden by me. I am requesting that the court vacate the five-year jail sentence handed by the Phnom Penh Municipal Court on October 6 of last year and release us,” he continued.

 

Under Articles 253, 254, 605, and 586 of the Criminal Code, they were charged with "accomplices of arrest, imprisonment, and unlawful confinement with aggravating circumstances," "measures to hinder law enforcement with aggravating circumstances," and "abuse of power."

 

Sitha and his 25-year-old daughter Tha Sreyleak, who works in the identification department, are still on the loose.

 

The verdict will be delivered on September 23 by Presiding Judge Sin Visal.