KUALA LUMPUR: A health drink seller nicknamed “Ustaz Casanova” was sentenced by the Syariah High Court to 12 months’ jail and ordered to be whipped six times for having sex with a woman out of wedlock.
Mohd Razis Ismail, 34, admitted to sexual intercourse with the 40-year-old woman, who was not his lawful wife, at a hotel room in Jalan Haji Hussein between March and May 2012.
The woman gave birth to a girl on Dec 6 that year.
Mohd Razis was reported to have been married 13 times and have eight children. He was clad in the Federal Territories Islamic Religious Department (Jawi) grey lock-up clothing when in the dock yesterday.
Two of his ex-wives and his four-year-old twin daughters were in the public gallery.
Syarie judge Nassir Abdul Aziz said he had considered the charge, seriousness of the offence, the background of the accused and the consequences to the parties involved.
“The accused used a religious image to carry out his activities until it became viral, embarrassed the religion and caused negative perceptions to those religious people who genuinely carry out their work,” he said.
Also, Mohd Razis had pleaded for a lesser sentence but did not show remorse, he said.
The judge said the court had noted that Mohd Razis had knowingly committed the offence which was wrong under Islamic law.
He said a “corrective approach should be taken” against the accused to rehabilitate him, and that this could be done in prison for a certain period.
Besides that, public interest warrants an appropriate sentence be meted out against Mohd Razis as he had deceived many into marriage, resulting in his nickname, Nassir said.
In a lower Syariah court later, Judge Mohd Saifullah Hamzah fixed March 14 for the sentencing of Mohd Razis on other charges, related to attempted polygamy and marrying without permission from a registrar.
Yesterday, Jawi senior Syarie prosecutor Zainor Rashid Hassin told the lower Syariah court that the accused projected an image of being an ustaz and a religious officer.
“He wrongly gave his status as a bachelor when he already has three wives,” he said.
He said Jawi’s investigations showed that the accused had married 13 women between 2003 and 2011.
Mohd Razis had on Feb 29 admitted to three charges of attempted polygamy without getting the written permission of the Federal Territory Syariah Court, involving three women, aged 24, 30 and 40, between 2010 and 2012.
He had also admitted to two charges of marrying two women, aged 24 and 40, in Golok, Thailand, and here respectively, without getting permission from a registrar, between 2010 and 2012.-thestar
