POLICE in George Town are looking at widening the search for rotten apples in an internal corruption probe, following the escape of a suspected drug trafficker on remand at Bayan Baru lock-up on Sunday.

“We have some information but we are trying to corroborate,” said Penang police chief Chuah Ghee Lye.

“I can confirm that money was paid, because they won’t do this for free. We are also trying to identify who made the payment.”

Chuah said the “corruption problem” in the case was concentrated on the five cops in the van during the incident, but police would widen their investigation to find others who might had been involved.

“They have not indicated anyone outside their circle but we will probe other officers at the centralised lock-up. They work in shifts. One eight-hour shift has more than 20 people on duty.

“There may be others involved. There may be other wrongdoings involved. It will be a thorough probe,” he said, adding that it was a case of rotten apples.

Chuah said the priority was tracing the escapee, who he believed had left Penang.

“We are still looking for him around Penang, Kedah and other places. He used to operate in Kedah. We will look for him in places he used to frequent.

“So far, we established that the escapee had asked the to be sent to a particular location to look for someone. From our interrogations, we found out that this fisherman was mentioned and that he could arrange for an escape route.”

Chuah said the fisherman has so far denied having met the suspect.

“We have to talk to the fisherman to find out what was planned and discussed,” he said.

Deputy Inspector General of Police Noor Rashid Ibrahim said police would also be looking to improve on police standard operating procedures (SOP) to prevent further cases from repeating.

“We will take strict action to all police members that are involved, then we will see the weakness of the SOP and improve on it. We do not compromise, we will make sure that this is a lesson to other police officers.

“We have enough witnesses, and I think in the nearest time we will prosecute them in court,” he said to reporters at Bukit Aman today.

On Sunday, Anuar Ayat, 43, escaped from custody at Bayan Baru lock-up, while on remand for trial. Initially, police reported that he escaped from a police van that was also transporting five officers and two other detainees, while they were on route to the Balik Pulau Hospital on Sunday.

However, investigators are now saying that claim was false, leading to the arrest of the five officers in the van, plus three others.

Reportedly, they were taking the detainees, including Anuar and two others, who were not even handcuffed during the journey, to meet their families. The van also did not break down, giving Anuar the chance to flee, as alleged in the police report.

Anuar was originally arrested and charged in 2015 for trafficking a substantial amount of drugs. He had been held in Alor Setar prison in Kedah until being transferred to Bayan Baru on July 6.  – July 11, 2017.