The "C" family has one of the worst case/switch statements out there. When Java et. al. cloned it, they should have provided an alternative. Perhaps keep the old style for backward compatibility, but provide a new one with different key-words to avoid confusion. Example:

       select(a) {
         when 1,2,3 {...}
         when 4 {...}
         when 5,6 {...}
         otherwise {...}
       }