Professor Ho Hock Lai delivers Coomaraswamy Professorial Lecture

The Coomaraswamy Professorial Lecture, titled “Proof and Presumption of Criminal Elements”, was delivered by Professor Ho Hock Lai at the NUS Bukit Timah Campus on 20 April 2023. Guests included Justice Vinodh Coomaraswamy and Shoba Coomaraswamy Segar (the children of former Justice Punch Coomaraswamy), Dr Chan Sek Keong, Professor Tommy Koh, veteran lawyer T.P.B. Menon, Emeritus Professor Koh Kheng Lian and Justice Chao Hick Tin, with Justice Choo Han Teck as chairperson.

The Punch and Kaila Coomaraswamy Professorship in the Law of Evidence was endowed as a gift in the will of Mrs Kaila Coomaraswamy, the wife of former Justice Punch Coomaraswamy. Mr Coomaraswamy, one of the founding members of the Faculty, taught the law of evidence from 1959 to 1969 as a visiting lecturer. The Professorship aims to advance his life-long love of the law of evidence, and to commemorate his commitment to equipping students with a sound grasp of the theory, principles and application of the law of evidence in Singapore.

The lecture began with the theme that the prosecution generally carries the burden of proving the elements of the crime. If the prosecution fails to discharge this burden, the accused person is presumed innocent and, for that reason, has to be acquitted. Sometimes, the prosecution may seek to rely on a rule of presumption in order to make the accused person carry the burden of disproving a criminal element. This lecture explored the logical operation of this type of rule as a burden-shifting device, identified a principal source of anxiety over its use, and analysed the different modes of resisting the attempt to have a presumption drawn. Selected provisions of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1973 and cases on those provisions served as examples in the discussion.

About the Speaker

Ho Hock Lai is the Coomaraswamy Professor of the Law of Evidence at National University of Singapore. He obtained his first law degree from the National University of Singapore (LLB) in 1989, his postgraduate degree, the BCL, from Oxford University in 1993, and his doctorate from Cambridge University in 2003. He was called to the Bar of the Supreme Court of Singapore in 1990. His research interests lie mainly in the law and theory of evidence and proof, and the administration of criminal justice.