Two men, one of them a Royal Cambodian Armed Forces captain, were sentenced by Phnom Penh Municipal Court to prison terms yesterday for their involvement in the murder of a 28-year-old man in a drunken argument at a nightclub last year.

Presiding judge Heng Kesaror sentenced businessman Sar Kim Phalla, 32, to 12 years in prison for the killing, and RCAF captain Khy Visal, 28, to 18 months in prison – 10 months of which was suspended – for negligently allowing Phalla to use his gun in the murder in Phnom Penh’s Daun Penh district.

“The court convicted Sar Kim Phalla and sentenced him to 12 years imprisonment over the allegations of murder and using a weapon without authorisation,” Kesaror said.

“It convicted Khy Visal and sentenced him to 18 months – but the term of his punishment to be implemented is only eight months, and the rest of his sentence was suspended – over allegations of carelessness in allowing another person to take his gun and use it in the shooting death of another person,” he added.

Kim Phalla was charged under Article 199 of the penal code, while Visal was charged under Article 20 of Cambodia’s law on weapons and ammunitions control, Kesaror said. They were arrested on January 24, 2013.

Touch Sarin, chief of Srah Chak commune, where the shooting occurred, said that the police report stated that the two accused were drinking and dancing at a club on the night in question.

While there, Kim Phalla got into an argument with a group of five youths, who allegedly threatened to beat him when he told them not to talk so loudly, he continued.

Angered by the group’s response, Kim Phalla took Visal’s pistol from his trouser pocket and fired three times at the group, killing the 28-year-old victim, according to Sarin, who said that after the shooting, the two accused managed to escape, though they were arrested several weeks later.

The two defendants and their defence lawyers could not be reached for comment yesterday.