The suspect was captured on Sunday in a raid on a house in the northeastern Malaysian town of Taiping along with two other ethnic Chinese men aged 31 and 26 suspected of harboring the alleged assassin, reports The Wall Street Journal. Police acted on a tip which came after images of the suspect were released nationwide.
Hussain was killed and his wife was seriously injured when a gunman opened fire on the couple in a parking lot. The murder was captured by a closed circuit camera.
According to MSN, police are still investigating a motive but some observers suspect the killing was over a land deal. Hussain was leaving a Chinese temple scheduled for demolition at the time of his death. Some sources speculate that Hussain was targeted for opposing the demolition, reports Malaysian newspaper The Sun.
A 44-year-old cab driver was previously arrested for allegedly aiding the murder suspect.
The killing was one of several recent violent crimes which have had Malaysian citizens on edge. Public shootings have occurred with increased frequency in 2013. At the six month mark this year 322 people had been murdered, up from 291 people murdered mid-2012.
According to The Economist, "police attribute the rise in violence to the repeal in 2011 of the colonial-era Emergency Ordinance. [The repeal] allowed for the release of 2,600 former detainees, many of them hardened gangsters, back onto the streets last year."
Police have attempted a crackdown against gangs, making hundreds of recent arrests and increasing nightly patrols.
However, Dr. P. Sundramoorthy, a criminologist at the University Science Malaysia, noted that "Still there is plenty of room for improvement, as the police need to address all the crimes with same speed as they usually do in high-profile cases."
