{"id":45472,"date":"2026-06-18T15:53:36","date_gmt":"2026-06-18T13:53:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/?p=45472"},"modified":"2026-06-18T17:53:30","modified_gmt":"2026-06-18T15:53:30","slug":"accused-no-3-challenges-the-legality-of-his-arrest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/2026\/06\/18\/accused-no-3-challenges-the-legality-of-his-arrest\/","title":{"rendered":"Suspect Gatwech Lam who is an accused No. 3 challenges the legality of his arrest"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em><strong>By Yiep Joseph<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p>The third accused in the high-profile case involving suspended First Vice President Riek Machar has challenged the legality of his arrest and detention.<\/p>\n<p>Appearing before the court during its 89th session on Wednesday, Accused No. 3, Gatwech Lam Pouch, who is also a member of parliament, outlined a series of procedural concerns regarding the manner in which he was arrested and prosecuted.<\/p>\n<p>Lam told the court that he was arrested without a warrant and that no police case had been opened against him at the time of his detention.<\/p>\n<p>He further argued that no formal charges were presented to him upon his arrest.<\/p>\n<p>The legislator also questioned the legality of his detention, stating that investigators failed to obtain authorisation from the Speaker of the National Legislative Assembly before arresting him, despite his parliamentary status.<\/p>\n<p>According to Lam, investigations into the case only commenced after he had already spent several months in detention.<\/p>\n<p>He further argued that Parliament revoked his immunity only after he had been detained and that he was subsequently brought before the Special Court.<\/p>\n<p>Following submissions from the defense and deliberations by the court, Special Court Judge Dr. James Alala Deng adjourned the proceedings until Friday, 19 June 2026.<\/p>\n<p>The court is expected to resume with Accused No. 3 continuing his defense statement.<\/p>\n<p>The case, which involves several accused persons, including suspended First Vice President Dr. Riek Machar, remains one of the country&#8217;s most closely watched legal proceedings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Yiep Joseph The third accused in the high-profile case involving suspended First Vice President Riek Machar has challenged the legality of his arrest and detention. Appearing before the court during its 89th session on Wednesday, Accused No. 3, Gatwech Lam Pouch, who is also a member of parliament, outlined<a class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/2026\/06\/18\/accused-no-3-challenges-the-legality-of-his-arrest\/\">[Read More&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":45292,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[80,79,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-45472","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-national","category-news","category-politics"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/Judges-during-one-of-the-sessions-courtesy-photo.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45472","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45472"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45472\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45473,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45472\/revisions\/45473"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45292"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45472"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45472"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45472"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}