Police have denied that tests done in July in relation to protester Baharuddin Ahmad’s death were tantamount to an admission that Baharuddin was exposed to tear gas prior to his death during Bersih 2.0.

Cheras Police Forensic Laboratory Chemistry Department chief Supt Soo Me Tong was posed the question by Patrick Dass, the counsel for Baharuddin’s family, at a coroner’s inquest into his death today.

Soo was also asked whether the methods used were approved by any authority.

“We think this is the best method based on the resources available at the time.” he said.

Dass responded, “You are not answering the question, with all due respect. Is this established practice... to catch tear gas with nylon bags?”

NONE Soo, who has a Master’s degree in Chemistry and attended various forensics courses abroad, gave a negative response, and admitted that he had neither the experience nor training to deal with tear gas.

Earlier, during the examination-in-chief, he told the Kuala Lumpur magistrate’s court that he had performed a series of tests on July 21 last year, at a police firing range in Banting, Selangor, in order to obtain tear gas samples for comparison with materials gathered from Baharuddin's body.

After arriving at 9am and being briefed on how the FRU uses tear gas, he instructed the FRU officers present to fire their tear gas launchers and lob tear gas grenades, and measured the range.

When shot 45 degrees above the horizon, he said, the tear gas shells landed about 130 metres away. Shot shot horizontally, they landed about 80 metres away, and then bounced another 30 metres.

Shot at ground level, the shells landed 20 metres away, then bounced 60 metres.

When tear gas hand grenades were used, he and his team of six forensics officers found that these landed about 30 metres away, regardless of whether they was thrown over the head or under.

Once the smoke cleared, Soo said, he exposed two FRU officers to tear gas from shells, another two to tear gas from hand grenades, and another two were doused with a water cannon from an FRU truck.

Swabbed for skin and tear samples

He also instructed the officers exposed to tear gas to collect tear gas samples using a nylon bag, which he said was specially made to collect dry gas.

Once each exercise was completed, one officer exposed to tear gas shells and one officer exposed to tear gas grenades were immediately swabbed for skin and tear samples, and also had their shirts taken away.

The other two officers who were gassed only had their samples collected six hours later, to see if there was any trace of the gas left.

The officers doused with chemical-laced water were both sampled immediately.

Altogether, 12 swabs, six shirts, four nylon bags containing gas samples and a plastic container with chemical-laced water samples were collected, and were handed to investigating officer Sgt-Major Razali Mahmood to be turned over to the Chemistry Department for testing.

Soo said that he does not know the results of the tests.

The inquest, which had resumed after earlier hearings in February, broke for lunch after Soo was asked to step down.