Ronald Beadle

I blogged about Ronald Beadle in 2006. Today he won his suit against the Government.

He was falsely imprisoned and passport unlawfully confiscated for 16 years.

Full report here. Reproduced in it's entire form below.

KUALA LUMPUR: Briton Ronald Beadle, whose passport was impounded for 16 years for alleged tax evasion, won RM3mil in damages for all the suffering he
endured.
Judicial Commissioner Tengku Maimun Tuan Mat ordered the Inland Revenue Board, its former assistant director-general and the Government to pay the 69-year-old RM2mil in general damages and RM1mil in exemplary damages.

“I am satisfied that the defendants had carried out their powers arbitrarily without any regard for the plaintiff’s interest,” Tengku Maimun said in her 25-page judgment.
She added that she did not think that Beadle had been falsely imprisoned due to the confiscation of the passport but was convinced that the defendants had unlawfully and improperly issued a directive for its seizure in 1981 to prevent the plaintiff from leaving this country until the sum of RM22,778.70 was paid.
“Their acts and neglects had caused him worry, stress, anxiety, mental anguish, distress, hurt and helplessness,” she said.
“His mind and self-esteem had been injured for more than 16 years, the greatest distress being the denial to visit his ailing father and to attend his father’s funeral in England.”

She said the fact that Beadle had come to Malaya in 1961, helped in the fight against the communists and then spent half his life here with the intention of settling down in the country permanently had aggravated his agony.
Last month, Beadle’s counsel Jeffrey Wong had tried to convince the High Court to grant between RM11mil and RM208mil to the retired army engineer for being wrongfully kept in Peninsular Malaysia between 1982 and 1998 for allegedly owing income tax payments of more than RM22,000.

In 1998, a High Court here cleared Beadle’s name from the said debt, and in 2000 he sued the then Inland Revenue Department for false imprisonment of 5,968 days.
In his suit, Beadle, who is a widower, had also sought RM2.9mil for loss of potential earnings during that period apart from the general and exemplary damages.

The court rejected his claims for loss of potential earnings on the grounds it was merely theoretical.

The defendants, who have denied all of Beadle’s claims, did not offer any witnesses.

The former assistant director-general Hamzah H.M. Saman passed away in 1999.

Beadle, who is from Derbyshire, England, was married to a Malaysian but his wife passed away three years ago.
Approached after the judgment, Beadle said he would be returning to England to be with his adopted daughter there but would be back here in September.
Beadle, who is contemplating an appeal against the quantum of judgment, said he was still interested in adopting Malaysia as his second home “if the authorities allow me to do so.”

My notes : Why did it have to come to down to this ? Is there no "Public Service Commision", Ombudsman or anything to protect the layman from these Little Napoleons ? Or no one really cares.