The Narathiwat Provincial Court has acquitted a well-known Malaysian singer and five other colleagues of drug procession but found them guilty on another count of consumption.
The New Straits Times and Malaysia Gazette reported on Thursday that Eda Ezrin and her co-defendants were acquitted of the more serious charge and later released.
The court said CCTV footage from the hotel where they were arrested did not show that the defendants had brought the drugs into the room where they were found, The Sun reported.
“On the contrary, there were three other individuals who brought the drugs into the rooms of the six accused,” the judges said.
The court found them guilty on a charge of consuming drugs and sentenced them to six months in jail and fined each of them 4,000 baht, according to the New Straits Times.
However, they did not have to serve the jail term or pay the fines as they had been detained for four months since their arrest last November and had shown good behaviour, the court added.
Eda Ezrin, 30, is the stage name of Wan Norshaheeda Azlin Wan Ismail. The Kelantan native rose to fame with her modern interpretations of dikir barat music, which makes her an idol especially among young people. She is hugely popular in northern Malaysia and southern Thailand.
Her fans were stunned by the news that she and five others, including her husband, had been arrested at a hotel in Sungai Kolok district in Narathiwat in November last year with 6,059 speed pills. Prosecutors indicted them for consuming and having the methamphetamine tablets in their possession.
The singer said earlier that she hoped to be released by the court and that her fans would continue to support her. “I hope that after I am released, my fans will continue to support me and give me the opportunity to keep making music again,” The Star quoted her as saying on Feb 28.
“This may be a test for me to become better,” she said.