I read with stark familiarity your report on the Anti-Corruption Agency investigation into allegations that the police had ordered the arrest of an alleged loan shark who had dared to press a lady friend of a police chief for payment of a loan.

Some years back in Temerloh, Pahang. the police arrested a chambering student who happened to be representing a client to execute a judgment on a property which happened to belong to a top police officer's relative.

For those unfamiliar with legal terms, 'execution' is the process in which a debtor's property may be seized by a court official and then sold off in an auction to pay a judgment debt.

The alleged loan shark in your report must have been really desperate to have allegedly done what he did. Most people know only too well to mess with the police.

The police can detain a suspect for 24 hours almost at their whim and fancy, without any need for a court order. After that initial detention, they can still detain the suspect for a further 14 days if an application is made to a magistrate for an extension of the remand.

Until recently, magistrates granted those extensions almost as a matter of course. It is time that such blatant violation of power and trust be dealt with severely.

I can't help but applaud the ACA for taking this matter seriously even though the victim is an alleged loan shark.