KUALA LUMPUR: The Federal Territory Islamic Department has lost its bid to question a ruling that its raid of a Borders bookstore over Islamic book was illegal.
The panel lead by Chief Justice Arifin Zakaria unanimous denied Jawi's leave to appeal, ruling that the religious department's question of law failed to meet the threshold of Section 96(A) of the Court of Judicature Act.
Section 96 (A) requires an appeal to the Federal Court to be either novel or of public interest to make it worth the court's time.
"The decision in High Court and Court of Appeal raised important issues of law, but we are not saying the decision is right or wrong," said Justice Arifin on Tuesday.
The three-man panel, which also included Justices Suriyadi Halim Omar and Ahmad Maarop made no order as to cost.
Jawi was appealing against the Court of Appeal's 2013 ruling that Jawi's search and seizure of Irshad Manji's book 'Allah, Liberty and Love' at a Borders bookstore was unconstitutional and procedurally improper.
On Dec 30, the panel found that the raid amounted to an abuse of discretionary power and the handling of Borders store manager Nik Raina Nik Abdul Aziz unreasonable.
Nik Raina was arrested by Jawi on May 30, 2012 and charged before the Syariah Court with the offence of disseminating and distributing by way of selling books deemed contrary to Islamic law.
However on Feb 26 this year, the Syariah High Court ordered a discharge not amounting to acquittal for Nik Raina.
Her lawyer, Rosli Dahlan told the media that with the Federal Court's decision, Nik Raina would be a free woman.
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