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A man who was convicted of drug trafficking for handing two packets of heroin to his pregnant wife escaped the gallows on Thursday, after the Court of Appeal overturned his death sentence in a 3-2 decision.
Roszaidi Osman, 50, was instead sentenced to life imprisonment, after the majority found that his major depressive disorder and substance use disorder substantially impaired his mental responsibility for his acts.
Roszaidi, who began consuming cannabis when he was 10 and was plagued by drug-related problems for most of his adult life, began delivering drugs in July 2015.
He was convicted of trafficking in 32.54g of pure heroin by the High Court in January 2019.
He appealed against his sentence and his lawyer Eugene Thuraisingam sought to have his sentence reduced to life imprisonment on the ground that he was suffering from an abnormality of mind that substantially impaired his mental responsibility for his acts.
Three of the five judges - Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon and Justices Judith Prakash and Belinda Ang - said Roszaidi's decision to traffic drugs was significantly influenced by his need to obtain drugs for his own consumption.
The Straits Times
