Roslan, a Singaporean, and Pausi, a Malaysian from Sabah, were both charged for the trafficking of 96.07g of diamorphine (pure heroin), and tried together in the same trial for the offence, before they were given the death penalty on 22 April 2010.
[1] A controversial point of the men's cases were that the pair had low IQ, and human rights activists urged the government of Singapore to commute their death sentences to life imprisonment on account of intellectual disability.
[5] A year after the first appeals of both Roslan and Pausi were rejected, Singapore decided to amend its death penalty laws in July 2012, imposing a moratorium on all 35 executions in the country, including Rosman's.
The changes, which took effect in January 2013, gave judges the discretion to sentence drug traffickers to life imprisonment with a minimum of 15 strokes of the cane instead of the death penalty, provided they were only couriers.
This option was available if the offender had received a certificate of substantive assistance from the public prosecutor for helping the narcotics police disrupt drug trafficking.
Pausi's lawyer Chung Ting Fai submitted that Puais was diagnosed with an IQ level of 67, and the psychiatric reports showed that he was unable to "think through his actions and consequences thoroughly".
Justice Choo found that the evidence before the courts did not persuasively show that Roslan and Pausi were suffering from an abnormality of the mind when the offence was committed, and they were able to comprehend the full magnitude of their actions.
Justice Choo also noted that while Pausi may have acted as a courier in this crime, Roslan played a more central role in the drug transaction and "directed the actions of others involved, and orchestrated its moving parts".
[10] One of the men, Roslan, was also involved in a separate lawsuit related to allegations that private letters between death row inmates and their lawyers or families were being sent from prisons to the Attorney-General's Chambers (AGC).
Roslan and the others argued that racial bias influenced the prosecution of capital cases, pointing to the disproportionate number of Malays on Singapore's death row.
[19][20][21][22] About 12 years after they were first arrested, Roslan Bakar and Pausi Jefridin had their execution dates set, and in their death warrants, the two men were scheduled to hang on 16 February 2022.
This issue was closely linked to the case of Nagaenthran Dharmalingam, who was also sentenced to death despite his alleged intellectual disability, and in spite of both local and international pleas for clemency.
[32] After gaining a temporary stay of execution, Rosman, Pausi and Roslan appealed together to the High Court and sought to declare their death sentences unconstitutional.
[36][37] Amnesty International, a global human rights organization, condemned the rise in scheduled executions as "appalling" and urged Singapore to impose a moratorium on the death penalty.
[39] The Anti-Death Penalty Asia Network (ADPAN) also issued a statement, urging Singaporean authorities to spare the lives of the drug traffickers recently scheduled for execution in the city-state.
[40] While their executions were temporarily stayed, both Roslan Bakar and Pausi Jefridin continued to pursue additional appeals in relation to their death sentences, whether individually or together.
On 3 August 2022, Roslan and Pausi were among 24 condemned prisoners who filed a lawsuit against the Attorney-General, claiming that their access to legal counsel had been obstructed, forcing them to argue their appeals without representation.
Roslan and the other plaintiffs argued that the law was discriminatory and would strip death row inmates of their final opportunity for justice, potentially resulting in an unfair legal process.
Justice Tay, who rejected the need to further postpone Roslan's execution, added that these upcoming legal applications did not have a bearing in his conviction or sentence, and stated that the additional two years Roslan received from his stay of execution since 2022 should provide him ample time and opportunity to resolve whatever non-urgent and urgent matters he needed to oversee, and noted that all his avenues of appeal against conviction and sentence were already used up.
[55] On 26 November 2024, a correction order was issued under the Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act (Pofma) against the anti-death penalty activist group Transformative Justice Collective for their social media posts, which falsely stated that Roslan, Pausi, and Rosman had been executed despite allegedly having intellectual and psycho-social disabilities.
The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) issued a statement confirming that the courts had repeatedly upheld in several appeals that the men did not suffer from diminished responsibility, despite their claimed intellectual disabilities.