Eugene Thuraisingam

since the move I get ping again, I have nothing much to add but the cases aren't routine coverage, as a Singaporean, I heard of those cases in each more than 20 - 30 times (on mainstream media, TV, multiple press) as those are in our context quite significant. A High Court decision against POHA granting by a state court and affirmed by Court of Appeal (with 2 - 1 with the Chief Justice in dissent) caused the government to issue a statement to state that they will not be ammending the POHA. This case even made multiple parliamentary answers. Hansard are there. All the rest of the case this lawyer handled are significant. However, the submitter needs to do the following
1. Use concise style (refer to WP:MOS). 2.Dig up more stuff, there prone to be tons of sources that will pass the BLP. With this I will still fail. I personally isn't keen to edit this myself, or publish this so if all the concerns raised are addressed by any editor, do give me a ping and I will then accept it. Thanks a lot --Quek157 (talk) 18:41, 12 May 2018 (UTC)}}

Hi Quek157 - I was concerned that, though carrying a lot of citations - most of which are RS - they mostly seem to be WP:ROUTINE court reporting including simple, one word mentions of Thuraisingam in passing (e.g. "so and so is represented by Eugene Thuraisingam") and not deep, biographical coverage. However, I agree it is on the edge so if you feel it should be passed I'll defer to your judgment. Chetsford (talk) 04:16, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

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Eugene Thuraisingam (born 10 June 1975) is the founding partner of Eugene Thuraisingam LLP, a law firm, specializing in Commercial and Criminal litigation. In addition to practicing in the areas which the law firm specializes in, Thuraisingam is a prominent human rights lawyer. His clients include Roy Ngerng, who was sued by the Prime Minister of Singapore and Jannie Chan, co-founder of The Hour Glass Limited. He has also represented The Online Citizen when it was sued by the Government of Singapore.

Education

Thuraisingam attended the Anglo-Chinese School (Independent) in Singapore. He then studied at the National University of Singapore. Thuraisingam graduated with an LLB in 2000 from the National University of Singapore, where he was placed on the dean’s list.

Career

Thuraisingam is qualified to practice as a lawyer in Singapore. He was admitted to the Singapore Bar in 2001. He has also practiced at various international arbitration tribunals. Thuraisingam worked at Allen & Gledhill in Singapore for 9 years and at Stamford Law Corporation for a further 3 years before founding the law firm, Eugene Thuraisingam LLP in 2012.

Thuraisingam has particularly since 2012 been involved in high-profile human rights cases representing Roy Ngerng who was sued by the Prime Minister of Singapore and The Online Citizen, when it was sued by the Government of Singapore. He has also represented numerous persons accused of criminal offences which carry the mandatory death sentence. He is a staunch opponent of and an outspoken critic of the death penalty.

Notable Cases

In 2014, Lee Hsien Loong, the Prime Minister of Singapore, sued blogger Roy Ngerng for defamation. Ngerng was represented by lawyers M. Ravi and Thuraisingam and subsequently solely by Thuraisingam. On 7 November 2014, Justice Lee Seiu Kin found Ngerng to have defamed Lee Hsien Loong in an online article whose contents suggested that the Prime Minister was guilty of criminal misappropriation. On 17 December 2015 the court led by Lee Seiu Kin handed down a judgement ordering Ngerng to pay S$100,000 in general damages and S$50,000 in aggravated damages. Ngerng, through his lawyer, Thuraisingam, proposed to pay the S$150,000 in instalments which was granted by the Prime Minister on the condition that Ngerng paid the S$30,000 in hearing costs immediately i.e. by 16 March 2016. Ngerng agreed to repay $100 a month from 1 April 2016 onwards over five years until 1 April 2021 when instalments are increased to S$1,000 until the full sum has been paid by the year 2033.

Also in 2014, Thuraisingam acted for Ilechukwu Uchechukwu Chukwudi who faced the death penalty for being suspected of committing the offence of drug trafficking. The High Court judge acquitted the accused of the charge of drug trafficking (Public Prosecutor v Hamidah Bte Awang and another [2015] SGHC 4). However, in 2015, the Court of Appeal reversed the High Court judge’s acquittal and convicted him on the capital charge. The Court of Appeal then remitted the matter to the High Court judge to rule on whether the accused should be sentenced to death, or to life imprisonment (Public Prosecutor v Ilechukwu Uchechukwu Chukwudi [2015] SGCA 33). In 2017, while the High Court sentencing proceedings were still on-going, Thuraisingam filed an application to the Court of Appeal to review its previous decision in 2015. This was on the basis that certain medical evidence which transpired after the Court of Appeal’s 2015 decision showed there was a powerful probability that the Court of Appeal made an error in convicting the accused. For the first time in Singapore’s legal history, the Court of Appeal agreed with Thuraisingam that there was a powerful probability that it had made an error in its 2015 decision. The Court of Appeal accordingly remitted the matter to the High Court judge, to hear further evidence and make findings on issues arising from the new medical evidence.

In May 2015, the Government of Singapore (the Ministry of Defence) obtained a protection order against The Online Citizen. The Online Citizen (founded in December 2006) is a community blogging platform involved in political activism in Singapore. It was later, after legal arguments made by lawyers Choo Zhengxi and Eugene Thuraisingam, overturned by the Court of Appeal in January 2017, which ruled in a 2-1 judgment that the Government of Singapore is ineligible as a 'person' to apply for a protection order against any individual.

In 2016, Thuraisingam was successful in arguing a novel point of law in the Court of Appeal in relation to standard of care in tort applicable in the context of a former employer preparing a performance reference for an employee. The Court of Appeal accepted his argument that the defendant-financial institution had breached its duty of care in preparing a reference check for a former financial services director, whom he acted for. The Court also found that the defendant’s breach caused the financial services to be deprived of employment in another financial institution. Accordingly, the Court reversed the High Court judge’s decision which had dismissed the financial services director’s claim, and remitted the matter to the High Court judge for assessment of damages. The High Court subsequently awarded the financial services director damages of SGD 4 million.

Also in 2016, Thuraisingam had conduct of four applications by persons who had been sentenced to death as a result of:- (a) being convicted with drug offences which attract the death penalty; and (b) not being given a certificate of substantive assistance by the Public Prosecutor. In these applications, he argued that the applicants’ death sentences were unconstitutional. The primary ground of challenge was that Section 33B(2)(b), of the Misuse of Drugs Act, by vesting in the Public Prosecutor the power to decide whether or not to grant a certificate of substantive assistance to a person who has been convicted of an offence punishable with the death penalty, in substance vests the Public Prosecutor with a judicial power, and is therefore in breach of the constitutional principle of separation of powers. These applications were eventually dismissed by the Singapore Court of Appeal.

Awards

Thuraisingam was presented with the Legal Assistance Scheme for Capital Cases award by the Chief Justice of Singapore in 2016 for his work in defending accused persons charged with capital cases.

References

This article "Eugene Thuraisingam" is from Wikipedia. The list of its authors can be seen in its historical and/or the page Edithistory:Eugene Thuraisingam. Articles copied from Draft Namespace on Wikipedia could be seen on the Draft Namespace of Wikipedia and not main one.

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