Some personal experiences have drawn a parallel to the current sensational "naked woman" saga. It highlights the lack of proper dicipline in the police force and the lack of independence when cases involving people in authorities are brought before them. Let me illustrate a case.

A 44 year old woman, who had been previously healthy, was brought into the Emergency in a semi-comatose state requiring assisted ventilation when oxygen saturations were low. She was reportedly well until she ingested some herbal medicines. It was then that she developed a sudden high temperature with stiffness of the entire body. After the initial investigations, she had biochemical evidence of acute pancreatitis and CT scan of the brain showed generalised cerebral oedema with a subarachnoid haemmorhage. She also went into DIVC requiring repeated transfusions and displayed evidence of a cranial diabetes insipidus. The twist is that the initial urine pregnancy test was positive. An ultrasound scan showed an empty uterus with no evidence of an extrauterine pregnancy. A repeat test was still positive before becoming negative several days later. Unfortunately, she never recovered conciousness and expired after a week in the ICU. The medical and ICU team were not certain of a the exact cause of death and thus agreed upon a post mortem. Moreover, there was a suspicion of poisoning and an earlier police report had already been lodged as per standard protocol in the emergency department.

It was then that the husband made obvious attempts at preventing the post mortem from being performed despite suspicion of poisoning and the unknown cause of death of this young and previously healthy lady. He made calls to the top police officers in Bukit Aman, who then sent a senior officer to the hospital. The initial offer from this senior cop stunned me. He offered to absolve all responsibilities from the hospital if we were to allow the body to be released and buried as per the request from the family. This was despite the medical team telling them that the cause of death was indeed unknown. The standard procedure for the police should have been to order for a post mortem. When we did not budge, he relented and offered to convince the husband. Later a relative, who was allegedly a commander in our air forces, arrived. However, they realised by then that the hospital will not issue a burial permit when the cause of death was unknown and a suspicion of poisioning and possible foul play was clearly visible.

The saga is unfolding and the findings of the post mortem, which is scheduled for today, will be interesting. My only fear is that unforseen forces will eventually prevail in concealing the true facts pertaining to the case.

The police, in this case, did not follow procedures and the investigation was hindered by authorities in higher positions. Why am I not surprised in a land where everything is possible? Malaysia Boleh!!