On the moment when he walked out of the Kajang Prison, Sam said: “The sky was bright and I felt a very positive aura. I feel that everything is new after losing touch with the outside world for so long.”
One of the first things he did was to have a bowl of wan tan mee.
“I had my first taste of wan tan mee after almost 30 years. I also had to learn how to use a handphone.”
He also had to get some new clothes after decades of prison uniform.
Sam is a man of God. The 59-year-old counsels people, leads daily worship and conducts Bible classes – in prison.
Until Monday, Sam was also a convict, serving a natural life term for possession of a gun.
He has now been pardoned by the Yang di-Pertuan Agong and is finally a free man after 28 years behind bars.
A natural life term, unlike a life term, would have doomed him to die in the prison. Anyone serving a life term can be freed after 20 years, with one-third remission.
Sam was arrested on Sept 13, 1988, for having a gun. He was 31 then.
He escaped the gallows because he was not the principal offender but was hit with a natural life sentence and also given six strokes of the rotan.
Recalling his days behind bars, Sam said that after the third year, he forced himself to learn English.
He began reading a bilingual Bible with an Oxford dictionary by his side.
He would also speak with other African inmates in English to practise.
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