Trapper's Swamp

I will be very surprised if there is no appeal filed by the DPP, but for now, let us rejoice in the decision.

The five were cleared of charges of taking part in a procession without a valid permit on Sept 16, 2007. If convicted, they would have faced a fine of up to $1,000 for the offence under the Miscellaneous Offences (Public Order & Nuisance) Act.

District Judge John Ng, in a written judgment, said he acquitted the five on the sole ground that he did not consider what they had done a ‘procession’.

‘The prosecution’s position appears to be that so long as a group of five or more people walked from one point to another point in a public place to commemorate an event, the people in that group had participated in a procession for the purposes of the Act…I am not able to agree with such a simplistic interpretation of the word ‘procession’,’ he wrote.

[...]The judge said that in the absence of a definition for the word ‘procession’ in the relevant legislation, taking the ‘natural and ordinary meaning’ of the word would be the starting point.

Citing two dictionary definitions of the word, he outlined three key features of a ‘procession’: a group of people moving together; as part of an event like a wedding; and moving in a formal way, in orderly succession and regular formation.

The group of five, he noted, had walked mainly on pedestrian pathways, and made ad-hoc stops for toilet breaks and to give out pamphlets. They walked ‘casually’, sometimes singly, sometimes in pairs or smaller groups.

He also noted that the walk ‘did not cause inconvenience to the public, affect traffic flow or make noise which disturbed the public peace’ – which ‘fortified’ his view that the law had not been broken, as the law was meant to relate to offences against public order and nuisance.

The questions that remain are if an appeal will be lodged by the prosecution, and if Parliament will see fit to tighten or broaden the language of this law.