Former Police Officer Tried for’ 98 Killing

The Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Wednesday tried a former police official accused of killing a 27-year-old man in Phnom Penh’s Meanchey district in 1998. Som Khem, 41, a former First Lieutenant from the Interior Ministry’s anti-terrorism department, admitted during the hearing that he had been involved in an argument with the victim, Uy Vanna, on Jan 11, 1998, but said that he had killed him accidentally. “I shot in the ground twice, but the bullet ricocheted and hit him. I did not intend to kill him and I regret my error very much,” he said in court on Wednesday. Cheng Penghap, lawyer for the victim’s family, disagreed that the shooting was accidental. “He intended to kill my client; what he says is untrue,” Mr Penghap said. Following the incident in 1998, Mr Khem went on the run for years, until he was caught and arrested in June in Battambang province, where he was working as a taxi driver, according to the court. While still in hiding, Mr Khem was sentenced in absentia by the Phnom Penh Municipal Court to 15 years prison and ordered to pay the victim’s family $5,000 in compensation. “I request that the judge uphold the court’s 2003 verdict sentencing Mr Khem to 15 years in prison and ordering him to pay $5.000 compensation,” Mr Penghap said at the hearing. Presiding Judge Oeung Seang said that the verdict would be announced on Nov 30. Several police officials have been arrested for involvement in shootings this year. In September, two military police officers were arrested for killing a man outside a Phnom Penh nightclub, and another police officer was arrested in August for killing and robbing a woman on a Phnom Penh street.