Less than 24 hours before he was due to face the gallows, Sarawakian Kho Jabing was granted a stay of execution yesterday (Nov 5) by the Court of Appeal, after his lawyer filed a last-minute motion on Wednesday, reported Channel News Asia ( CNA ).

The local television reported Kho’s execution, originally scheduled for Friday morning, has been postponed, pending the hearing of the case before the Court of Appeal.

The temporary reprieve will allow the 31-year-old’s newly-appointed lawyer Chandra Mohan K Nair, who was briefed by Kho’s family on Tuesday, more time to prepare Kho’s case.

The prosecution has objected to the stay of execution, telling the court that the motion did not raise any arguable issues.

Kho and an accomplice, Galing Kujat, were convicted of murder in 2010 and sentenced to be hanged.

On appeal in 2011, Kujat escaped the gallows when his conviction of murder was substituted with a conviction of robbery with causing hurt and sentenced to 18.5 years’ jail with 19 strokes of the cane, while Kho’s appeal failed.

However, the law was changed in 2013 to abolish the mandatory death penalty in certain categories of murder and allow judges the discretion to sentence an accused to life imprisonment and caning instead.

On re-sentencing, Kho was handed down a sentence of life imprisonment with 24 strokes of the cane.

The prosecution appealed, urging the Court of Appeal to reverse the re-sentencing judge’s decision and impose again a death sentence on Kho, arguing that his attack on the victim was “extremely vicious”.

In January this year, the five-judge Court of Appeal sent Kho back to face the gallows in a split 3-2 decision.

Kho’s appeal for clemency was rejected last month by President Tony Tan Keng Yam but a date has yet to be fixed for the court to hear Kho’s case, CNA reported.

- Bernama