Innocent until proven guilty

Recently, I was asked by my aunt to change some money for her upcoming trip to India. She changed something closed to S$3k in a mix of US$ and Rupees. She then made a wholly separate business trip prior to her vacation and upon her return, could not find the foreign currency at home. Since only 1 other aunt, my grandma and the maid stay with her, the natural suspect was the maid, S. Over the next few days, they searched her room and the house whenever S was not around or outside washing the car. They did not find the money but mysteriously found a bowl of soup under her drawer. They found it really odd since they have never ill-treated the maid and she always has plenty of food so apart from the fact that she could have given the food to someone else, they could not understand why she has to store food under her drawer.

When they still could not find the money after a few days, they decided to report the case to the police. The police also fingered S as the prime suspect and suggested that they bring her in for questioning. As they require a Javanese interpreter to be present and an interpreter could only be available at 10.30pm, they suggested that my aunts bring the maid in at 10.30pm and let her spend the night at the police station. 

When I was told about this, everything about it sat uneasily with me. I cannot hold the moral high ground and say "Why of all people do you suspect the maid?" Given the circumstances, I would have pointed in the same direction. I might have been reluctant to send the maid for questioning but if the loss of the money bothered me that much, I suppose there wasn't any other choice. I kept quiet. I fought every urge to have my say over the family email. My family has always been very pro-PAP, and extoles the wonders of what the Singapore Government has done for us. I am no Jayaretnam and I appreciate our economic stability and safe nation. I too felt a sense of pride when MM Lee was received so warmly by Obama but I can never understand why the older generation do not strive for something more. Why are they happy that the roads are clean and the streets are safe? What about civil liberties? Free speech? Freedom of expression? Some would give me the whole "If you had seen Singapore in the 50s and 60s, you'll appreciate all these too". I wholeheartedly agree.. but still, why do we linger in the past? Why do we not look to progress beyond that? I digress.. my point being if I had said anything, I would been rubbished for being young and, ironically, innocent.

As it turns out, what was supposed to be 1 night spent in the police station became 2 nights. Today, my aunt got a call from the investigating officer. S had maintained her innocence and they find no case against her.

Then the email that really made my blood boil. My aunt wrote the email to the entire family to give an update on the situation. To be fair to her, she said she's just happy everything is sorted out and since the police says she's innocent, then so be it, let's all move on. BUT, she goes on to talk about what S went through, how she was locked up in a prison cell, how she was handcuffed and then as if to bait me into saying something, she goes "Question to our Family Lawyers: Can the police handcuff a suspect?"

WTF! What do you expect? Did you think she was going to invited into a hotel room, maybe a spa package was thrown in, and then after she is all relaxed, they'll set the questions out in a questionnaire form, give her a nicely sharpened pencil and let her answer the questions at her own time? 

For fuck's sake! 

My cousin can go ahead and try and explain criminal procedure to the family. I am soooo not replying that email.