The Malaysian Bar is mulling whether to appeal the admission of Jude Balacious Pereira, who was the investigating officer in the Sodomy II case, as an advocate and solicitor by March 25, 2015.

Bar vice-president Steven Thiru told Malaysiakini that they have yet to decide on the matter.

"We have a month from the date of the decision to file an appeal, and if we decide to appeal (or not)," he said.

It was reported that the Ipoh High Court had allowed the former police superintendent's petition of enrolment to be a practising lawyer within three months from Dec 17, the date of the court's decision.

However, Justice Lee Swee Seng ordered that Pereira attend some human rights seminars, forums, activities or programmes organised by the Bar Council's human rights committee.

Justice Lee said if there were no such programmes, the petitioner must attend other relevant programmes by the Bar Council to allow him to have a period of reflective conscientisation with respect to the ethos of human rights especially of detainees under the criminal justice system.

The judge said the programmes should not be viewed as a punishment but that in all seriousness would serve as a kind of reflective rehabilitation for his new role.

Pereira retired from the police force during the Anwar Ibrahim Sodomy II trial and was under contract then before retiring.

Bar Council objected to his admission earlier

Previously, it was reported that the Bar Council objected his application to be a lawyer by filing a review following the investigating officer’s role in the arrest of five lawyers during a candlelight vigil of some activists in 2010.

This was after Suhakam held an inquiry chaired by then-commissioner Muhammad Shafee Abdullah, which found Pereira not to be a credible witness in the inquiry.

The five lawyers filed separate suits against the police, and won at the Kuala Lumpur High Court when the judge ruled the arrest unlawful and that they had been falsely imprisoned when they were held overnight.

Justice John Louis O'Hara awarded them RM75,000 each.

On deciding the objection raised by the Bar Council, Kuala Lumpur High Court judge Justice Zaleha Yusof ruled on Jan 15 that the former police officer was unfit to be a lawyer, following Suhakam's findings that the former police officer was not a credible witness.

On appeal at the Court of Appeal later this year, the court set aside the KL High Court order and found that Pereira had not yet filed his petition under Section 15 (1) of the Legal Profession Act 1976 for enrollment and admission as advocate and solicitor.

Following this, the appellate court ruled that the High Court had not sat to hear his petition and ordered that matter to be heard first, resulting in the Ipoh High Court decision.

Ironically, Shafee, who chaired the Suhakam panel, headed the prosecution team in the Sodomy II appeal.