Gabriel Susayan and Partners

On the court record

The firm's record shows the statutory bar in the Occupational Safety and Health Act 1994 to civil claims, and the interplay of the section 37(da) trafficking presumption with the section 114(g) adverse-inference provision in a drugs appeal.

Gabriel Susayan and Partners appears in the corpus as counsel in civil-procedure and criminal-appellate work, argued in the High Court (Mahkamah Tinggi) and the Court of Appeal (Mahkamah Rayuan).

On the civil side the firm acted for an appellant in litigation involving employment-injury and workplace-safety claims against corporate defendants. The court addressed the striking-out principles under Order 18 rule 19(1) of the Rules of Court 2012 and the requirement of obvious unsustainability, the competency of an affidavit affirmed by a solicitor who lacked personal knowledge under Order 41 rule 5, and the statutory bar in section 59 of the Occupational Safety and Health Act 1994 against a civil action premised on a breach of the general employer's duty in section 15. The judgment also considered whether the appellant could introduce an occupiers'-liability case at the appellate stage, holding parties bound by their pleadings, and the equitable doctrine of laches alongside section 32 of the Limitation Act 1953.

On the criminal side the firm acted for an appellant before the Court of Appeal in an appeal against a conviction for trafficking under seksyen 39B(1)(a) Akta Dadah Berbahaya 1952 (section 39B(1)(a) of the Dangerous Drugs Act 1952). The catchwords, in Malay, engage pembuktian milikan, jagaan dan kawalan serta pengetahuan terhadap dadah (proof of possession, custody and control, and knowledge of the drugs), the statutory presumption under seksyen 37(da) and the countervailing presumption under seksyen 114(g) Akta Keterangan 1950 (section 114(g) of the Evidence Act 1950), where the prosecution had failed to call suspects remanded together with the appellant, and the leading-to-discovery principle under section 8 of the Evidence Act 1950. The firm's record combines careful civil-procedure work with serious criminal-appellate advocacy across both languages. In each field the emphasis falls on the gatekeeping questions that decide a case before its merits, whether a claim can survive a strike-out and clear a statutory bar on the civil side, or whether the prosecution has displaced the presumption of innocence once the section 37(da) presumption is engaged on the criminal side, so that the firm's work is characteristically directed at the burdens and presumptions that govern how a dispute is resolved.