E135 - Boys Will Be Boys: Zulfarhan Osman Zulkarnain

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[SPEAKER_00]: This is Jessica, and you're listening to the Asian Madness podcast.

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[UNKNOWN]: Thanks for watching, and I'll see you in the next one!

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[SPEAKER_00]: It's the last episode of 2025, so happy holidays in the dance to you if you celebrate.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Hopefully this year has treated you well, and you've made time for your hobbies, family, friends, but most importantly for yourself.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It's easy to get lost in the daily life of school, work, and other people, and you end up neglecting yourself.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Make sure you keep yourself happy and healthy.

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[SPEAKER_00]: because without that, everything kind of sucks.

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[SPEAKER_00]: That's my opinion, just saying.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Anyway, what are we talking about today?

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[SPEAKER_00]: Today's case is actually a listener's suggestion.

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[SPEAKER_00]: So in case you're still around, thank you, Moona, from Malaysia.

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[SPEAKER_00]: So let's get into it.

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[SPEAKER_00]: You know how sometimes the people you trust or people you're supposed to trust turn out to be the ones who hurt you?

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[SPEAKER_00]: a stranger hurting you, not cool, but you might get over it.

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[SPEAKER_00]: A family member, somebody you know personally, well that will complicate things.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It can be emotional injury, but it can also be fatal.

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[SPEAKER_00]: This is one of those stories.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It starts with a young man, only 20 years old, and maybe could debt with a dream to one day become a captain.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But that dream was never realized because his life was cut short.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Over a ridiculous misunderstanding, or so it seems.

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[SPEAKER_00]: This was not an accident, and it wasn't just one person's doing.

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[SPEAKER_00]: His name is Zilfarhan, Osman, Zilkarnin, accused of a petty crime.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And even if true, the punishment did not fit the crime.

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[SPEAKER_00]: We will find out how a simple accusation turned into one of Malaysia's most disturbing campus crimes.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Let's begin.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Before his name became a headline, before the courtroom drama and a heartbreak, so Farhan, Osman, so Karnayn, was just a boy with a dream.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Born on November 29, 1996 in Koala Lumpur, Farhan, as his loved ones called him, which also meant joy, wasn't the loudest in the room.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He was not the kind of boy to pick fights or draw attention to himself.

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[SPEAKER_00]: In fact, his father once described him as quiet, respectful, and the kind of son that any pair would be proud of.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The kind who followed rules, the kind who stayed out of trouble.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Farhan had a younger brother, and according to reports, his mother struggled with miscarriages before finally giving birth to her oldest son.

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[SPEAKER_00]: So understandably, he was a source of joy in his parents' life.

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[SPEAKER_00]: From a young age, Farhan had won gold to become a navy captain, not just a soldier, but a leader at sea.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And this dream was rooted deep in him, tied to Malaysia's proud maritime history, and his fascination was ships.

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[SPEAKER_00]: So when he got accepted into the National Defense University of Malaysia,

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[SPEAKER_00]: He enrolled in a naval program, studying electrical engineering.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He was smart, disciplined, and took his role seriously.

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[SPEAKER_00]: His parents had every reason to believe he was on the right path.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They still remember the day they dropped them off at the university.

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[SPEAKER_00]: His mother, Haua, said he told her to look through his belongings if she ever missed him.

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[SPEAKER_00]: That simple gesture stayed with her.

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[SPEAKER_00]: and yet, universally life was not perfect.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Living in a dorm surrounded by high-pressure routines and strict military culture, tensions were bound to rise.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The usual things kids complain about cropped up, shared spaces, clashing personalities, noise, what have you.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It was never anything serious, and despite it all, Farhan never got a disciplinary record.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He wasn't a type to bully or haze others, which might have made him stand out, but for the wrong reasons.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He wasn't like the others, and in places like these, where the idea of holding power is everything, being different, can be dangerous, it can put a target on your back.

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[SPEAKER_00]: so what happened to Farhan?

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[SPEAKER_00]: It all started with a silly laptop.

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[SPEAKER_00]: May 21st, 2017.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Inside the dorms of the National Defense University of Malaysia, a group of students approached 20-year-old Farhan.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Their tone was off, accusatory, and aggressive.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They claimed he had stolen a laptop.

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[SPEAKER_00]: but they didn't believe him, or maybe they didn't care.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They could have just been out for random blood.

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[SPEAKER_00]: So instead of having a conversation about it like regular people, what followed was an ambush.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They pushed them, punched them, dragged them back to his room like he was a criminal.

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[SPEAKER_00]: What happened behind those closed doors over the next several hours was nothing short of torture.

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[SPEAKER_00]: On the surface, it was about a laptop,

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[SPEAKER_00]: From 2.30 in the morning until sunrise, Farhan was beaten with plastic pipes, hangers, hoses, whatever they could grab and use as a weapon.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But the worst item they used was a steam iron.

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[SPEAKER_00]: One by one, they took turns pressing it into a skin, dragging it across as chest as back, even his private parts.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The pain must have been unimaginable, excruciating, reminiscent of the middle ages or something like that, definitely not what you would expect in the 21st century, and definitely not from a bunch of students who are supposed to be in school to learn and serve their country.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Fifty shades of messed up.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And all of this just a force of confession about a laptop, but Farhan never confessed because there was nothing to confess to.

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[SPEAKER_00]: At this point, if he had confessed, it would have made sense as well.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Torturing people to get a confession is not exactly a new tactic, but we definitely should know how flawed it is.

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[SPEAKER_00]: People confess under pressure, and people in military school shouldn't know better.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But again, were they really hung up on this laptop or were they just out there doing this whole?

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[SPEAKER_00]: Boys will be boistern.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They left him in the morning, telling anyone who asked that he was just sick.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And after their classes that day, they came back, not to check on him, but to do it all over again.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It was burberic, and I'm genuinely shocked that Farhan has managed to stay alive after all the beatings and pain and flicked it on him.

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[SPEAKER_00]: These degenerates used the same steam iron on the same exact woes, layering new burns over old ones.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They rotated the iron between the six of them, taking turns torturing their clasmet.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And in between beatings, they actually tried to treat his injuries.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Not that it helped, because rubbing ointment on second degree burns hardly undoes the damage.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Believe it or not, they spend the next few days repeating the same process.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Be, torture, leave, return, rinse and repeat.

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[SPEAKER_00]: If these are the people being trained to protect your country, how safe are you really?

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[SPEAKER_00]: But you know what really comes to mind when hearing about all this?

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[SPEAKER_00]: Where are the hell are the teachers?

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[SPEAKER_00]: the other students.

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[SPEAKER_00]: How was it that no one heard all this going on, or perhaps were other students' suspicions but unable or unwilling to say anything, fearing that day would be next?

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[SPEAKER_00]: This is a dorm room, not an off-campus house in the middle of nowhere.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Six days after the first attack, they finally brought them to a small private clinic.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I do not understand the train of thought here, but then again, none of this makes sense to me.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The doctor, assuming his injuries came from military training, gave him some medication and sent him right back back to the same hands that had tortured him.

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[SPEAKER_00]: So ridiculous, I have no words.

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[SPEAKER_00]: By May 31st, 10 days after all this started, his condition became critical.

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[SPEAKER_00]: No shit.

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[SPEAKER_00]: These degenerates took him to the clinic again, but it was already too late.

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[SPEAKER_00]: In the early hours of June 1st, one of the students, Muhammad Amin, noticed something was wrong.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He sent another cadet, Muhammad Nazir, to check on Farhan, Nazir found him unresponsive.

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[SPEAKER_00]: When he said he couldn't perform CPR, Panic said in, and that's when they finally called an ambulance.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But like everything else in this frustrating case, the ambulance came to late.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Farhoun was pronounced dead shortly after arriving at Sardang Hospital.

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[SPEAKER_00]: When his parents got the call at around 1130pm, they drove through the night, 300 kilometers from Johor to Salan Gourth.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They arrived at 3am, desperate to see their son, but they weren't allowed to view his body until 9.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And when they finally did, they understood why.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The university initially claimed that he had died from a training accident, but this was very quickly disproven, because what kind of training incident would even cause this?

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[SPEAKER_00]: And if it did happen, where are the witnesses?

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[SPEAKER_00]: Wouldn't they need to file incident reports detailing the whole accident?

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[SPEAKER_00]: The way they tried to cover their ass just boils my blood.

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[SPEAKER_00]: When the autopsy results came in, it became pretty obvious.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Farhan's body had become a canvas of violence, flared, brutal, and very deliberate.

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[SPEAKER_00]: There were burns that had dried and crusted over, and others that were still raw.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Some had scabbed.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Others were slick with a mix of blood and fluid, exposing the muscle beneath.

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[SPEAKER_00]: A patch on this right shoulder, roughly the size of a hand,

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[SPEAKER_00]: a large burn on his chest, nearly the width of a sheet of paper, overlapping with others like they'd been stacked one over the other.

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[SPEAKER_00]: On his abdomen, a similar pattern, burns over burns.

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[SPEAKER_00]: His flanks, midsection, forearms, torso, all marked with areas of damage flesh, even his private areas were not spared.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Of those 29 were third degree burns, the kind that killed tissue down to the bone.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Just 3% were first degree, meaning barely any of the injuries were superficial.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Most of the damage was severe, spread across 80% of his body.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It wasn't hard to figure out what did it.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The patterns were too specific.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Straight edge rounded at the corners, very consistent.

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[SPEAKER_00]: a steam iron.

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[SPEAKER_00]: A genuine accident would not produce such pattern burns, but it wasn't just burns.

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[SPEAKER_00]: There were other signs, signs of physical assault.

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[SPEAKER_00]: A bruise under his left eye, a cut across his brow, internal bleeding from the scalp, on the left, right, and center of his skull.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The forensic expert who testified said it plainly, even if Farhan had made it to the hospital sooner,

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[SPEAKER_00]: His chances would have been slim.

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[SPEAKER_00]: His skin had started to melt.

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[SPEAKER_00]: His body was failing on every level.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Massive fluid loss.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Infection.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Damage organs.

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[SPEAKER_00]: A complete breakdown of the systems that keep a person alive.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Hypovolemic shock.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Bacterial spread.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Electrolite collapse.

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[SPEAKER_00]: his body was sticky, not just from sweat, but because a skin barrier was no longer intact.

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[SPEAKER_00]: This clearly was not the work of just one person.

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[SPEAKER_00]: At first, this was seen as a case of bullying gone too far, but once the severity of the situation was made clear, Farhan's father filed a police report because he wanted to call it what it was.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Murder.

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[SPEAKER_00]: After all the examinations, Farhan was eventually buried in Johor Baru in the city where he was born.

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[SPEAKER_00]: His mother, Haua Osman, had already suffered various miscarriages before Farhan came into her life.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Wash the boy she fought desperately for, be lowered into the ground.

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[SPEAKER_00]: His dreams cut short by people he once would supposedly call brothers.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Then the important question everyone began to ask.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Why didn't anyone stop it?

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[SPEAKER_00]: That's when their investigation really began.

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[SPEAKER_00]: As it usually goes, the truth did not come out all at once, and it usually never does.

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[SPEAKER_00]: We call that trickle-truthing.

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[SPEAKER_00]: 90 burns, some so severe that they reached this muscle in bones.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Farhan's burns were so grave that there was simply no recovering from them, even with dedicated team of doctors.

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[SPEAKER_00]: By mid-June 2017, just two weeks after Farhan's death, police had arrested 19 students.

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[SPEAKER_00]: All of them were from the same university.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They were all men, most of them just 21 or 22 years old, and six of them were charged with murder or a bedding murder.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The rest were just charged with causing harm in order to force a false confession.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Because remember, that was the excuse, a missing laptop.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But now you're probably wondering, why did they accuse Farhan to start with?

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[SPEAKER_00]: Of all the students, why him?

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[SPEAKER_00]: Was it random?

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[SPEAKER_00]: What led them to believe that this quiet, unproblematic young man had anything to do with a stolen item?

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[SPEAKER_00]: Let me clarify.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The reason was not grounded in any kind of logic or investigation.

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[SPEAKER_00]: would it have been slightly better if these assholes genuinely believed Farhan was a thief?

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[SPEAKER_00]: You tell me.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Let's go back a bit in time now, on the night of May 20th, 2017, around 930 p.m.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The student named Akmall Zohari noticed his brand new laptop was gone.

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[SPEAKER_00]: annoyed he turned to a few with friends in the dorm and said, check Farhan's locker.

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[SPEAKER_00]: No clarity of why he thought it might have been Farhan, but his friends checked his locker anyway and found nothing.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They went into his room and checked, still nothing.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But the strange seat of doubt was already planted, so suspicion had already locked on to Farhan.

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[SPEAKER_00]: One of Farhan's roommates offered an unusual suggestion.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He told the group that his father,

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[SPEAKER_00]: The roommate made the call, explained the situation, and he got a dancer from his father.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The thief was one of three people, and one of those names was Farhan.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And this was all they needed to hear.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Witnesses said that this was the moment things changed.

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[SPEAKER_00]: That was when Akma reportedly snapped and said, I'm going to teach Farhan a lesson.

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[SPEAKER_00]: By 3 a.m., Farhan still asleep was dragged from his bed, he was wearing only his pants.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He was taken to another dorm room and questioned about the laptop.

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[SPEAKER_00]: When his answers didn't satisfy Ockmall and the others, they beat him.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Farhan said he didn't take it.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He said it over and over.

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[SPEAKER_00]: A student in a nearby room heard the chaos and the sounds of people moving in and out, heard Farhan's voice, heard him being pummeled.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The next evening around 6.30 pm, someone saw Farhan again, back in his room, slumped, trying to change his clothes.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He couldn't even put on a shirt without help.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He was in pain barely moving, but it wasn't over.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Early the next morning, May 22nd, a new round of questioning began.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They took him again this time to room 410, which was Akmahl's room, maybe because it offered them more privacy.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Farhan's supposed friends also followed.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Some stayed for hours, watching and waiting for the torture to end, but it never did.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Farhan was beaten again.

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[SPEAKER_00]: By then, he wasn't even wearing pants, just his underwear.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Witnesses said 12 people were in that room.

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[SPEAKER_00]: One after the other, they took turns beating him.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And then the iron came out.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Between 4.55 and 5.45 a.m., a student named Abdul Hakim was seen holding a steam iron and instructing five others to use it on Farhan's body, and they did.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Again and again, Farhan screened with each press of the metal, his hands were tied, his feet too.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Eventually he lost consciousness.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They'd only stopped on the morning prayer call at go to cross the campus.

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[SPEAKER_00]: At 7.30 a.m. someone else walked into room 410 and saw 18 students inside.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Farhan was lying there, burned, broken, and barely clothed.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Abdul Hakim, they said, didn't press to iron himself.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He gave the orders.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He also gave a warning.

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[SPEAKER_00]: No one was to tell the authorities.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Not a single word.

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[SPEAKER_00]: By May 23, a student from a neighboring room came looking for a friend, instead, he found Farhan, shirtless, barely covered from the waist down, skin blistered and blackened in places.

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[SPEAKER_00]: There was blood, patches of burn flesh, and yet no one took into the hospital.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The perpetrators tried to care for him, themselves.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Most likely to cover our evidence of their depravity, not out of love or concern.

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[SPEAKER_00]: may be to keep him alive just long enough to avoid a body, but not to save him.

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[SPEAKER_00]: One student disturbed by what he saw, wrote a letter, a plea for help.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He slipped in front of the Army Central Hospital, hoping someone would read it and intervene.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Unfortunately, it was found by the wrong people and shared on a WhatsApp group.

19:55.321 --> 19:59.747
[SPEAKER_00]: On May 26, Farhan was moved again this time to a hotel.

19:59.807 --> 20:03.772
[SPEAKER_00]: The plan was to sneak him into a private clinic the next day.

20:04.834 --> 20:06.857
[SPEAKER_00]: The rest of course, we already know.

20:06.897 --> 20:14.507
[SPEAKER_00]: That baseless revelation by the shaman was all the boys needed to justify torturing a fellow classmate to death.

20:15.588 --> 20:19.033
[SPEAKER_00]: So many terrible decisions were made those few days.

20:19.013 --> 20:23.177
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's put aside for a second whether or not we believe the Shaman was being real or not.

20:23.878 --> 20:25.339
[SPEAKER_00]: He mentioned three names.

20:25.859 --> 20:27.821
[SPEAKER_00]: Why was only Farhan asked about it?

20:28.742 --> 20:34.367
[SPEAKER_00]: Clearly these people already held a strange grudge against him, or they found him an easy target.

20:34.868 --> 20:40.453
[SPEAKER_00]: So even if the laptop turned up eventually, they would probably still find a way to say he was involved.

20:42.755 --> 20:46.759
[SPEAKER_00]: The trial officially started in January 2018.

20:46.942 --> 20:50.531
[SPEAKER_00]: and it didn't take long for a witness after witness to paint a chilling picture.

20:51.453 --> 20:53.318
[SPEAKER_00]: Friends testified, roommates.

20:54.200 --> 20:57.829
[SPEAKER_00]: Other students admitted they saw or heard what was happening.

20:58.383 --> 21:08.617
[SPEAKER_00]: Some tried to help, one student even sent anonymous letters to the university higher-ups, but instead of taking action, someone afforded the letter to a WhatsApp group.

21:08.637 --> 21:17.269
[SPEAKER_00]: And once the abusers saw that they were discovered, they simply moved Farhan to another location to continue their torture instead of stopping.

21:17.249 --> 21:18.991
[SPEAKER_00]: Doctors testified too.

21:19.612 --> 21:23.678
[SPEAKER_00]: Dr. Osvar treated Farhan at a clinic after he was finally brought in.

21:24.619 --> 21:30.428
[SPEAKER_00]: The burners were so severe that Dr. Osvar told the students to take him to a hospital immediately, but they didn't.

21:30.968 --> 21:37.097
[SPEAKER_00]: They took him back to campus, possibly scared of what might be found if they took him to a hospital.

21:37.482 --> 21:45.162
[SPEAKER_00]: Even when Farhan returned to the clinic again, weak, dehydrated, and barely holding on, they still didn't take him to a hospital.

21:46.024 --> 21:47.408
[SPEAKER_00]: Not until it was too late.

21:48.687 --> 21:56.737
[SPEAKER_00]: In court, the forensic report confirmed that after 90 burns, over 29 of which were third degree, his body was shutting down.

21:57.458 --> 22:01.002
[SPEAKER_00]: His heart, his kidneys, everything was collapsing from the trauma.

22:01.883 --> 22:03.165
[SPEAKER_00]: But the defense pushed back.

22:03.765 --> 22:06.869
[SPEAKER_00]: They tried to argue that there was no intent to kill.

22:07.730 --> 22:15.960
[SPEAKER_00]: That the burns were just part of the interrogation that they loved Farhan, which was why they avoided burning his face.

22:16.379 --> 22:22.750
[SPEAKER_00]: Wow, I get that the fence attorneys are paid to, you know, defend, but what the actual fuck.

22:24.272 --> 22:32.706
[SPEAKER_00]: These little shits admitted to pressing the iron on his thighs, chest, feet, everywhere, but they claimed they didn't think it would kill him.

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[SPEAKER_00]: A very likely story.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The courtroom hurt things no one should have set out loud.

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[SPEAKER_00]: One of these students said he only pressed to iron down because someone handed it to him.

22:44.688 --> 22:49.173
[SPEAKER_00]: Another said that he waived it near the skin, but didn't expect it to cause damage.

22:50.094 --> 22:58.102
[SPEAKER_00]: One by one they tried to explain, to soften what they had done, to distance themselves from the monsters that they actually are.

22:59.163 --> 23:02.686
[SPEAKER_00]: But the facts were brutal, and the facts didn't care how sorry they were.

23:03.647 --> 23:04.408
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's be real.

23:06.937 --> 23:14.907
[SPEAKER_00]: Shockingly in 2021, four years after Farhan's death, the court delivered a verdict that many saw as far too lenient.

23:15.568 --> 23:21.395
[SPEAKER_00]: Instead of being found guilty of murder, the six were convicted of causing death without intent to kill.

23:21.435 --> 23:32.910
[SPEAKER_00]: They were sentenced to 18 years in prison, but because their sentence started from the day of their arrest in 2017, it was effectively cut down by nearly four years.

23:32.890 --> 23:36.778
[SPEAKER_00]: Twelve others were also sentenced to just three years with taking part in a torture.

23:37.841 --> 23:41.048
[SPEAKER_00]: The public reaction to this verdict, of course, wasn't great.

23:41.749 --> 23:45.698
[SPEAKER_00]: They grieved, but also raged that the system had failed.

23:46.439 --> 23:52.232
[SPEAKER_00]: It had failed Farhan and every future victim who might suffer silently in a dorm room like he did.

23:53.495 --> 23:55.117
[SPEAKER_00]: The prosecution wasn't done though.

23:56.058 --> 24:01.644
[SPEAKER_00]: They filed an appeal, pushing back against the idea that this was just a case of things going too far.

24:02.525 --> 24:03.706
[SPEAKER_00]: Their argument was clear.

24:04.407 --> 24:10.454
[SPEAKER_00]: The accused men used a hot iron over and over again, on someone who was helpless.

24:11.275 --> 24:12.556
[SPEAKER_00]: They knew what they were doing.

24:13.057 --> 24:16.701
[SPEAKER_00]: They chose to keep going, and now they have to answer for it.

24:17.828 --> 24:26.821
[SPEAKER_00]: And so, in 2024, the case came back into the spotlight, and for the family still grieving their son, it offered them one last chance.

24:28.483 --> 24:32.008
[SPEAKER_00]: It had been two years and seven months since the high court handed down its ruling.

24:33.050 --> 24:40.360
[SPEAKER_00]: The ruling in which Siksyong men were convicted not of murder, but of manslaughter, and sentenced to 18 years.

24:41.352 --> 24:46.096
[SPEAKER_00]: But in May of 2024, the case returned, this time, to the court of appeal.

24:46.817 --> 24:51.501
[SPEAKER_00]: The prosecution wasn't ready to let it rest, especially not with the nature of this crime.

24:52.482 --> 24:55.124
[SPEAKER_00]: They pushed for what they believed had always been the right charge.

24:55.884 --> 24:57.346
[SPEAKER_00]: Murder, plain and simple.

24:58.467 --> 25:01.049
[SPEAKER_00]: And for the six men responsible, deaf.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Standing before a panel of three appellate judges, deputy public prosecutor, K.

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[SPEAKER_00]: 29 of them 3rd degree, the kind that cut their skin into muscle, exposing what tissue.

25:17.629 --> 25:19.212
[SPEAKER_00]: Completely irreversible.

25:19.914 --> 25:24.825
[SPEAKER_00]: Even if doctors had gotten to Farhan earlier, the damage was already too much.

25:26.797 --> 25:34.711
[SPEAKER_00]: These six men, Akma, Azamuddin, Najib, Afeif, Shogurin, and Hakim were not bystanders.

25:35.532 --> 25:37.115
[SPEAKER_00]: They didn't fail to act.

25:37.776 --> 25:43.346
[SPEAKER_00]: They just acted repeatedly, taking turns, scolding him, torturing him.

25:44.227 --> 25:48.535
[SPEAKER_00]: Hakim didn't even touch the iron, but he stood over them, giving orders.

25:49.443 --> 26:03.077
[SPEAKER_00]: The prosecutor reminded the court that this was not hazing, this was not discipline, this was pure violence, is that what's being taught in the military, torture until you get what you want, whatever means necessary?

26:03.097 --> 26:11.606
[SPEAKER_00]: I highly doubt that, but it really makes a school look bad, especially if they insist on doing damage control by downplaying the situation.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Like, sir, this is murder.

26:14.789 --> 26:32.730
[SPEAKER_00]: And then, she brought the focus back to what mattered, Farhan's family, their grief, the loss of a son, a brother, a boy with a future, because mother's words echoed in court, her plea that punishment should match not just a crime, but the cruelty in which it was done.

26:34.313 --> 26:37.678
[SPEAKER_00]: But on the other side, there was a different kind of appeal happening.

26:38.419 --> 26:46.732
[SPEAKER_00]: The defense lawyers representing 18 of the students pushed back against the verdict, arguing that they deserved a lower sentence.

26:46.752 --> 26:57.788
[SPEAKER_00]: Some claim their clients only acted once, others so that they met no real harm, that they helped take far-hunter the clinic, that they were just young and didn't know it would go this far.

26:58.790 --> 27:01.013
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, boys being boys,

27:02.495 --> 27:06.279
[SPEAKER_00]: Hakim's lawyer took a different route, one that shocked the courtroom.

27:06.920 --> 27:18.072
[SPEAKER_00]: He tried to turn and put the blame back onto the victim, suggesting Farhan had opportunities to seek help and that he could have left the room, made a call, or told someone else.

27:18.953 --> 27:20.755
[SPEAKER_00]: But even the judges wouldn't entertain it.

27:21.616 --> 27:26.942
[SPEAKER_00]: One of them asked flatly, are you really blaming the boy who was tied up and tortured for his own death?

27:27.923 --> 27:29.785
[SPEAKER_00]: The fucking audacity of these people.

27:31.064 --> 27:39.676
[SPEAKER_00]: The prosecutor fired back, reminding them all, Farhan couldn't even sit up, couldn't walk without help, couldn't put on a shirt without help.

27:40.397 --> 27:47.606
[SPEAKER_00]: His lips are cracked from dehydration, because body had melted and had gotten stuck against the backseat of the car that took him to the clinic.

27:48.768 --> 27:52.633
[SPEAKER_00]: The judge listened, for three days, they heard every word.

27:53.052 --> 27:56.978
[SPEAKER_00]: And then on July 23rd, 2024, the verdict came down.

27:57.038 --> 28:00.382
[SPEAKER_00]: This time, the court did not hold back.

28:01.324 --> 28:05.710
[SPEAKER_00]: They overturned a man's law to verdict, and all six men were found guilty of murder.

28:06.992 --> 28:09.876
[SPEAKER_00]: Just like that, the 18-year sentence was gone.

28:10.537 --> 28:12.039
[SPEAKER_00]: All six were sentenced to death.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And the 12 others had their three-year sentences extended to four.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Justice Hadharia, Said, Ismail, leading the panel, said the previous court had made a mistake, focusing too much on which specific injury had caused for her health's death.

28:30.262 --> 28:31.063
[SPEAKER_00]: As of that mattered.

28:32.645 --> 28:41.196
[SPEAKER_00]: Under Malaysian law, for a murder charge to stand, the prosecution only had to prove that they accused intended to inflict injuries likely to cause death.

28:42.137 --> 28:47.123
[SPEAKER_00]: Not which injury, not how many, just that the intention was there.

28:47.693 --> 28:49.836
[SPEAKER_00]: and that the judge's agreed was clear.

28:50.677 --> 28:52.178
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm sure it's clear to all of us.

28:53.620 --> 28:57.304
[SPEAKER_00]: Five of the accused had taken turns pressing the iron into Farhan's body.

28:57.945 --> 29:01.810
[SPEAKER_00]: They tied him up, ignored his screens, continued while he collapsed.

29:02.611 --> 29:06.936
[SPEAKER_00]: A key may not have touched the iron, but he told them to do it, and he watched.

29:07.937 --> 29:10.120
[SPEAKER_00]: It doesn't make him less guilty or a better person.

29:11.181 --> 29:16.367
[SPEAKER_00]: So the court called it what it was, inhumane, sadistic, and unforgivable,

29:18.862 --> 29:23.771
[SPEAKER_00]: Just as Hadharya said this case had shaken both the court's conscience and the publics.

29:24.473 --> 29:27.759
[SPEAKER_00]: She said no parent should have to see their child suffer the way far-handed.

29:28.581 --> 29:31.186
[SPEAKER_00]: She described it as one of the rarest of the rare cases.

29:31.807 --> 29:37.157
[SPEAKER_00]: A level of cruelty so extreme, it demand the harshest sentence the laws allowed.

29:37.137 --> 29:42.143
[SPEAKER_00]: For Farhan's parents, it was a kind of justice, one that they waited years to see.

29:42.183 --> 29:49.312
[SPEAKER_00]: His father said he was so relieved that the system had finally seen his son, and seen what those other so-called boys are.

29:49.352 --> 30:01.947
[SPEAKER_00]: His mother said that while she wished the boomle, or the shaman, who had falsely accused her son would come forward in the apologize, he would forgive him if he had to curse to at least admit that he was wrong.

30:03.023 --> 30:07.608
[SPEAKER_00]: While that's a nice sentiment, people who commit such crimes are usually not very nice.

30:09.170 --> 30:19.402
[SPEAKER_00]: Three days after the ruling, Farhan's father shared an radio interview that not a single one of the 18-month sentence had apologized, not in court, not after.

30:19.442 --> 30:25.689
[SPEAKER_00]: Only one ever had the 19th accused who was acquitted and never laid a hand on Farhan.

30:26.410 --> 30:28.913
[SPEAKER_00]: He apologized, the rest stayed silent.

30:31.373 --> 30:39.280
[SPEAKER_00]: On the same day, the verdict was handed down, the six murder convicts filed an appeal to the federal court, the highest court in the country.

30:40.401 --> 30:42.502
[SPEAKER_00]: The final hearing came on February 28, 2025.

30:43.523 --> 30:47.086
[SPEAKER_00]: And just like that, it changed again.

30:47.867 --> 31:01.178
[SPEAKER_00]: The federal court overturned the murder conviction, saying there was insufficient proof of intent to kill.

31:01.158 --> 31:03.570
[SPEAKER_00]: their 18-year sentences were reinstated.

31:04.736 --> 31:06.987
[SPEAKER_00]: Farhan's father said very little after that.

31:08.073 --> 31:09.379
[SPEAKER_00]: What else is there to say?

31:10.473 --> 31:17.180
[SPEAKER_00]: No matter how long they served, they would still walk out a prison one day, while his son would never do anything ever again.

31:17.200 --> 31:29.454
[SPEAKER_00]: He set a few of the convicts' families had approached him in private, said that they were disgusted with what their sons had done, and that he forgave them, partially, but he didn't want to see any of them ever again.

31:29.494 --> 31:33.578
[SPEAKER_00]: Not at a reunion, or a gathering, or even at the prison gate.

31:34.891 --> 31:39.540
[SPEAKER_00]: Especially not after they had all this time to say something, but they said nothing.

31:40.743 --> 31:45.773
[SPEAKER_00]: Franz father then addressed to human rights groups who had lobbied against the death penalty in this case.

31:46.454 --> 31:53.989
[SPEAKER_00]: He asked where they were when his son was being tortured, when he was being scalded from head to toe, while 18 people just watched.

31:54.831 --> 31:55.853
[SPEAKER_00]: That's a fair question.

31:57.166 --> 31:58.027
[SPEAKER_00]: So there you have it.

31:58.628 --> 32:03.814
[SPEAKER_00]: The absolute brutal, unjust, and evil murder committed on one young man by 19 others.

32:04.475 --> 32:05.817
[SPEAKER_00]: Over a stupid laptop.

32:06.898 --> 32:10.142
[SPEAKER_00]: But of course, it never was about the laptop, was it?

32:11.203 --> 32:16.089
[SPEAKER_00]: It was just an excuse for depraved of stupid young men to act on their unhinged fantasies.

32:16.910 --> 32:19.293
[SPEAKER_00]: These guys should never have been admitted to this school.

32:20.134 --> 32:22.617
[SPEAKER_00]: Do they show discipline, respect?

32:22.597 --> 32:28.123
[SPEAKER_00]: honor, integrity, accountability, the list goes on, but you get my point.

32:28.804 --> 32:32.629
[SPEAKER_00]: If they rely on school to teach them all of this, then it's a little too late for them.

32:33.750 --> 32:34.952
[SPEAKER_00]: So instead what do we get?

32:35.772 --> 32:50.730
[SPEAKER_00]: A young man with a dream, a group of classmates who turned on him, a crime that was brushed off as hazing until it couldn't be ignored any longer, and a justice system that gave and then took back

32:50.710 --> 32:54.556
[SPEAKER_00]: The death penalty is a topic that divides people, understandably.

32:55.317 --> 33:01.666
[SPEAKER_00]: Some say it's justice, others say it's just another case of violence, and that violence does not justify more.

33:03.028 --> 33:14.165
[SPEAKER_00]: But in cases like these, where the cruelty was slow, deliberate, and shared among so many, where the victim was silent for days while people walked in and out of the room and did nothing.

33:15.547 --> 33:20.194
[SPEAKER_00]: What do you think?

33:21.389 --> 33:23.996
[SPEAKER_00]: If not, what punish would would make more sense?

33:24.618 --> 33:26.703
[SPEAKER_00]: Do we measure justice by punishment?

33:27.385 --> 33:32.800
[SPEAKER_00]: Or by the message it sends to the next group of students who might believe silence protects them?

33:33.961 --> 33:40.092
[SPEAKER_00]: I would love to hear your thoughts on this, and as always, thank you for listening to this episode of Asian Madness.

33:41.134 --> 33:50.030
[SPEAKER_00]: This was very cruel and very barbaric, and I sincerely hope for our hands family is healing and moving on, as difficult as it may be.

33:51.051 --> 33:52.214
[SPEAKER_00]: Fuck those other guys, though.

33:53.115 --> 33:56.982
[SPEAKER_00]: Please take care, be kind, and see you next year.