[1][2] On 20 March 2009, during an anti-drug operation by the Central Narcotics Bureau, Rosman bin Abdullah, then 40 years old, and a female accomplice, Aneeza d/o Abdul Majeed, were both arrested in a hotel at Bencoolen Street, Singapore.
[3] In response, the defence counsel, led by Ram Goswami, argued that Rosman was unaware of the contents of the bundle and did not know he was smuggling diamorphine.
The amendments, which came into effect in January 2013, granted judges in Singapore the discretion to sentence drug traffickers to life imprisonment with a minimum of 15 strokes of the cane, instead of the death penalty, if they were only couriers.
This option was available if the offender received a certificate of substantive assistance from the public prosecutor for aiding the narcotics police in disrupting drug trafficking.
He also submitted a new psychiatric report by Dr Munidasa Winslow, a psychiatrist in private practice, to seek a reduction of his death sentence on the grounds of diminished responsibility.
He also noted that Rosman had an extensive polysubstance use history, which stemmed from childhood neglect and exacerbated by his low IQ and undiagnosed ADHD, and the condition had a contributory effect to his offence of drug trafficking.
[8] Rosman was also involved in a separate lawsuit concerning 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).
This led the inmates to initiate legal action against the AGC or its officials for alleged misconduct, violations of their rights, and seeking damages for any harm caused.
[12][13] In August 2021, 17 Malay death row inmates, including Rosman, filed an appeal against their sentences, claiming racial discrimination.
Rosman and the other inmates argued that the prosecution of capital cases was influenced by racial bias, highlighting the disproportionate number of Malays on Singapore's death row.
[21] At that time, the scheduling of the executions of both Roslan and Pausi garnered widespread controversy due to the fact that the inmates in question were reportedly diagnosed with low IQ, and the anti-death penalty groups argued that the death penalty should not be carried out for both men on the grounds that they had intellectual disabilities, and this was also related to the case of Nagaenthran Dharmalingam, who was also sentenced to death despite his alleged intellectual disability and both local and international pleas of clemency.
[29] The Anti-Death Penalty Asia Network (ADPAN) also released a statement to implore the Singaporean authorities to spare the lives of Rosman and those who were recently scheduled for execution.
[33][34][35] On 3 August 2022, Rosman was among the 24 condemned prisoners (which included murderer Iskandar Rahmat and drug traffickers Pannir Selvam Pranthaman and Abdul Rahim Shapiee) who filed a lawsuit against the Attorney-General, claiming that the obstruction of their access to legal counsel forced them to argue their appeals without representation.
Rosman and the other plaintiffs argued that the law was discriminatory and would deprive death row inmates of their last opportunity for justice, potentially leading to an unfair legal process.
Justice Hoo further noted that the Act's provisions did not violate the legal rights of the death row prisoners, as the law had not yet been enforced.
Ravina Shamdasani, a spokesperson for the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), implored to the government to commute Rosman's death sentence to life imprisonment.
In the statement, signed by the EU Member States and of Norway, Switzerland and the United Kingdom, the EU appealed to the Singapore authorities to abolish capital punishment, stating that the death penalty was a "cruel, inhumane and degrading" punishment, which was "incompatible with the inalienable right to life", and condemned both the death warrant of Rosman and the two prior executions of drug traffickers that happened a week before Rosman's scheduled hanging.
[54][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 claimed that Rosman and the two others (identified as Roslan Bakar and Pausi Jefridin) hanged a week before him were executed despite their alleged intellectual and psycho-social disabilities.
The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) released a statement to confirm that the courts had already upheld in multiple appeals that the men never suffered from diminished responsibility in spite of their purported intellectual disabilities.