List of major crimes in Singapore (before 2000)

The following is a list of major crimes in Singapore that happened before 2000. They are arranged in chronological order.

1950s

1950

• 29 June 1950: 10-year-old Winnie Annie Spencer was found dead in a beach around Labrador Park. Autopsy reports shown that Winnie was raped and strangled to death. After some police investigations, 25-year-old Joseph Michael Nonis was arrested and charged with her murder. At the trial which started on 24 October 1950, although he signed a confession and no need to go onto the stand, Nonis insisted to do so and revealed on the stand that he was innocent, and claimed he was tortured by Chief Inspector Rayney, who forced him to pen down and sign the confession of how he killed Winnie (He also testified he was afraid of Rayney who had tortured him before, and who had gained notoriety for having allegedly tortured and forced people into giving statements to the police during the Japanese Occupation of Singapore). The late David Marshall, who was Singapore's most reputed lawyer at that time and who was representing Nonis as his defence lawyer (Marshall would later on become the first Chief Minister of Singapore), called in witnesses who were formerly tortured by Rayney to testify. They confirmed Nonis's description of Rayney's treachery. All of Nonis's family members and acquaintances also testified that Nonis was seen at home on the same night when Winnie was murdered, which supported Nonis's alibi defence. A psychiatrist was also called in to assess Nonis's character and the confession written by Nonis; the psychiatrist said on court that such a confession could only be written by an individual of psychopathic behaviour, and Nonis's true character did not fit that of a psychopath. After a trial lasting 9 days, in view of the evidence, the 7-men jury found Nonis not guilty of murder and as a result, Nonis was discharged and acquitted of murder, and walked out of the court a free man. As of today, the rape and murder of Winnie Spencer remains unsolved, and the murderer(s) were never found.[1]

1960s

1963

• 12 July 1963: A prison riot occurred at an experimental-type offshore penal colony on Pulau Senang. A group of 70 to 90 inmates led by Tan Kheng Ann (alias Robert Black), started a riot which destroyed and burned everything the inmates had built on Pulau Senang. During the riot, prison officer Daniel Stanley Dutton and his three assistants - Arumugan Veerasingham, Tan Kok Hian and Chok Kok Hong were murdered by the rioters, including Tan. Around 58 men were accused of murder and rioting (the others received jail terms for rioting). After a five-month-long trial, 18 men (including the leader Tan Kheng Ann) were convicted of murder and hanged in Changi Prison on 29 October 1965. Another 29 men were found guilty of rioting - among them, 11 were sentenced to 2 years' jail for rioting with the other 18 getting 3 years' jail for rioting with deadly weapons. The remaining 11 men were acquitted and freed.[2][3]
• 27 August 1963: 22-year-old Jenny Cheok Cheng Kid had disappeared in the sea during a scuba-diving trip in the straits between Sisters' Islands. A few months later, her boyfriend, Sunny Ang Soo Suan, was arrested and charged with murder (because there were evidence of Ang claiming numerous insurances for Cheok's possible death, and Ang's strangely calm behaviour at his girlfriend's disappearance, and many other incriminating circumstantial evidence against him); this was the first time in Singapore where a person could be charged with murder without a body, much less based on circumstantial evidence. On 18 May 1965, by a unanimous decision, the 7-men jury found Sunny Ang guilty of murder and thus, Ang was sentenced to death by the High Court. After failing in his appeals to the Court of Appeal and the Privy Council, and after the rejection of his clemency petition by President Yusof bin Ishak, Sunny Ang was hanged on 6 February 1967.[4] Till today, Cheok's body was never found.[5][6]

1965

• 10 March 1965: Known as the MacDonald House bombing, Indonesian marines Usman bin Haji Muhammad Ali (AKA: Janatin) and Harun Thohir (AKA: Harun Said Muhammad Ali) initiated an explosion at the MacDonald House alongside Orchard Road during the Indonesia-Malaysia Konfrontasi. The bombing caused the deaths of three people – 45-year-old driver Mohammed Yasin Kesit, and two female bank employees; 23-year-old Juliet Goh and 36-year-old Elizabeth Suzie Choo – and injured at least 33 people. Both Usman and Harun were later arrested and charged with murder. Eventually, both the marines were found guilty of murder and condemned to death by hanging. On 17 October 1968, more than three years after the bombing, the two men were hanged in Changi Prison.[7]

1968

• 24 May 1968: 19-year-old Ong Beang Leck was last seen alive by his father as he left his father's shop. Later on, Ong's father received two separate phone calls on 26 May and 5 June in which the caller claimed he had kidnapped Ong and demanded a ransom from Ong's father to free his son. A ransom of $20,000 was eventually negotiated and paid, but still, there was no sign of Ong. A week after the ransom was paid, a rental car owner found one of the cars he rented out three weeks before had a foul-smelling odour. Tests revealed that the smell was that of blood. The person who last rented the car was found to be 22-year-old Richard Lai Chun Seng. Lai confessed that he, along with four others, was part of a kidnapping, in which the victim was none other than the missing youth Ong Beang Leck. Lai also stated that he took part in the plan as he needed money to save his failing business, and that he thought the plan was to lure Ong into the rental car, render the youth unconscious and held him hostage until the ransom was paid; however, on the night of 24 May 1968, as soon as Ong entered the car, Lai was shocked to see the three of his four other accomplices taking out weapons he was unaware of and attacked Ong from the back of the car, which led to the boy's death. This relevation led to the arrest of the other four accomplices; one of them was Ong's 24-year-old close friend Lee Chor Pet, the others were 29-year-old Chow Sien Cheong, 32-year-old Lim Kim Kwee, and 23-year-old Ho Kee Fatt (the latter two had run off to Malaysia before their arrest by the Royal Malaysian Police). Lee led the police to a manhole in Jurong, where Ong's highly decomposed body was found. Lee, Lim and Ho, who were the three people assaulting Ong right from the back of the car, were charged with the murder of the youth. The three were found guilty of murder and sentenced to death on 11 June 1970, and all the three men were hanged on 27 January 1973. Richard Lai, who became the prosecution's main witness against the three murder defendants, was subsequently jailed for 4 years for his involvement in both the ransom negotiation and the abduction of Ong. For possessing the ransom money, the fifth accomplice Chow Sien Cheong was also given a 4-year jail sentence as well.[8]

1970s

1970

• 6 January 1970: 31-year-old dance hostess Mimi Wong Weng Siu (黄婉秀) and her 37-year-old ex-husband and sweeper Sim Woh Kum (冼松锦) murdered 33-year-old Ayako Watanabe, who was the wife of Wong's Japanese lover Hiroshi Watanabe. The murder was witnessed by the Watanabes's 9-year-old eldest daughter Chieko (Chieko would later become the prosecution's main witness against the couple), who came together with her mother and two siblings to Singapore to visit her father. Hiroshi, an engineer, who had an affair with Wong for 3 years and gotten disapproval from his wife regarding the issue, wanted to end the affair with Wong, who was not wiling to. Filled wth jealousy, Wong then asked for help from Sim, with whom she bore two sons, to help her in the murder. At the trial, both Wong and Sim (who initially admitted to his participation in the killing) pointed fingers at one another, with Wong even putting up a defence of diminished responsibility, with her psychiatrist Dr. Wong Yip Chong claiming that she caught the Japanese encephalitis virus from Hiroshi Watanabe and thus suffered from a viral brain infection at the time of the killing. However, she was found to be not suffering from any diminished responsibility by the prosecution's psychiatric expert. After a trial lasting 26 days, on 7 December 1970, both Mimi Wong and Sim Woh Kum were found guilty of murder and condemned to hang for murdering Ayako Watanabe. Their subsequent appeals against the sentence and pleas for presidential clemency were later rejected. On the morning of 27 July 1973, the couple were executed in Changi Prison. Mimi Wong was the first woman to be sentenced to death for murder in Singapore.[9][10]

1971

• 29 December 1971: Known as the "Gold Bars Triple Murders", 55-year-old businessman and gold bar smuggler Ngo Cheng Poh, together with his two employees Ang Boon Chai, 57; and Leong Chin Woo, 51, were murdered by a group of 10 men. The group had also robbed the three men of 120 gold bars worth $500,000. This robbery and murder was hatched by 25-year-old Andrew Chou Hock Guan, who was formerly in business with Ngo's and several other gold bar syndicates to smuggle and transport gold bars from Vietnam into Singapore through the Vietnamese flights bound for Singapore. Chou, who started this job in early 1971, later lost the trust of the syndicates when he lost US$235,000, the money meant for the syndicates' funding in the business (later, Chou managed to recover US$180,000, but the rest cannot be recovered). Frustrated with the loss of trust from the syndicates, Chou hatched a plan to rob one of the syndicates still in contact with him. He hired his 34-year-old elder brother David Chou Hock Heng, and two friends - Peter Lim Swee Guan, 24; Augustine Ang Cheng Siong, 25 - to plan the robbery and murder. 6 youths - Alex Yau Hean Thye, 19; Stephen Francis, 20; Richard James, 18; Konesekaram s/o Nagalingam, 18; Stephen Lee Hock Khoon, 16; and Ringo Lee Chiew Chwee, 16 - were hired by both Lim and Ang to do the killing, with the promise to pay $20,000 to each boy. The group of 10 were later arrested and charged with murder, while the stolen gold bars were later recovered by the police. Among the 10, only Augustine Ang confessed to his role in the murder and robbery. Ang was thus given a discharge not amounting to an acquittal, and consequently, for his participation in the murder, Ang was detained indefinitely without trial for more than 10 years before being released. Ang later became the prosecution's key witness against all the nine accused persons, who pleaded not guilty to the triple murder charges. Additionally, the Chou brothers also asserted that Ang was the mastermind of the robbery and murder, while the others stated they only helped to dispose or transport the bodies, even claiming ignorance to the robbery and murder. After a trial lasting around 40 days, on 4 December 1972, the judges rejected the testimonies of all the nine defendants while they accepted that the prosecution witness Augustine Ang was telling the truth, determining Andrew Chou as the mastermind and the equal roles played by all nine in the triple murder. All were found guilty of murder; however, out of the nine accused, seven of them (including the Chou brothers) were sentenced to death. The two remaining people – Stephen Lee and Ringo Lee – escaped the death penalty as they were both under the age of 18 at the time of the murders; both of them were detained indefinitely at the President's Pleasure. The subsequent appeals made by the seven condemned to the Court of Appeal and the Privy Council against their sentences (in which their respective lawyers argued that Ang's testimony should not be trusted); and their pleas to President Benjamin Sheares for clemency were all met with failure. On 28 February 1975, the seven men were hanged in Changi Prison.[11][12][13]

1972

• 22–23 April 1972: On Pulau Ubin, 25-year-old Harun bin Ripin (also named Harun bin Ariffin in some newspaper reports) and 19-year-old Mohamed Yasin bin Hussein (also named Mohamed Yasin bin Hussin in some sources) barged into the home of 58-year-old Poon Sai Imm and robbed her. During the robbery, when Harun went around the house to look for valuables to steal, Yasin was restraining the victim and tried to rape her. While he was trying to rape her, Yasin sat on Poon's chest, which led to fractures on her ribs, and these fractures led to Poon's death. The two men proceeded to dispose the body into the sea before returning to the mainland, but the body was unexpectedly fished out from the sea by a fisherman the following morning. 9 months later, when he was arrested for another crime, Harun surprised his interrogators by confessing to them about his involvement in the robbery. This confession led to Yasin's arrest, and the two men were charged with the murder of Poon Sai Imm. At the end of their trial on 15 March 1974, Harun was found guilty of robbery by night and sentenced to 12 years' jail and 12 strokes of the cane, while Yasin was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death. Although Yasin's appeal against his sentence was rejected by the Court of Appeal of Singapore in November 1974, his appeal to the Privy Council in London was accepted and he was sentenced to 2 years' jail for committing a rash/negligient act not amounting to culpable homicide. However, Yasin was brought back to court again and promptly charged with rape. At the trial on 11 May 1977, Yasin denied raping the elderly woman despite the forensic evidence presented by the prosecution and Harun's testimony against him. At the end of the trial on 12 May 1977, Yasin was found guilty of attempted rape and he was sentenced to 8 years' imprisonment.[14]
• 18 September 1972: A 22-year-old seamstress Cheng Li Zhen was walking along Queenstown with her sister when she suddenly screamed and collapsed to the ground with blood oozing out from her chest. It was only after she was in the hospital that they found that it was a gunshot wound. She never regained consciousness and died in the hospital soon after. The case remains unsolved.[15]
• 24 November 1972: Gunman Lim Ban Lim, who killed 27-year-old Corporal Koh Chong Thye on 23 June 1968, was ambushed by police officers in the vicinity of Block 6 near Golden City Theatre. Officers shot Lim three times in his body in a fire fight, killing Lim. His aide Chua Ah Kow shot himself dead during a gunfight three weeks later at Tank Road.[16]

1974

• 9 May 1974: 44-year-old Sim Joo Keow strangled her 53-year-old sister-in-law Quek Lee Eng over $2,000, before dismembering her body and keeping her torso in two earthen jars in her home. Quek's head and arms were found in a parcel near the Kallang River bank. Sim was sentenced to 10 years in jail in January 1975, after being convicted of culpable homicide not amounting to murder (or manslaughter) and hiding evidence.[17]

1975

• 25 May 1975: 54-year-old Mohamad Kunjo s/o Ramalan murdered his same-aged friend and lorry driver Arumugam Arunachalam by hitting him on the head with an exhaust pipe at Pulau Saigon Road. Mohamad Kunjo was later arrested and charged with murder. Both men were intoxicated at the time of the killing; forensic pathologist Dr Seah Han Cheow, who performed an autopsy on the body, discovered a high level of alcoholic content inside the victim's blood, leading him to raise a possibility of acute alcoholic poisoning that might have contributed to Arunachalam's death while testifying at the trial. Mohamad Kunjo, who raised a defence of intoxication at the time of the commission of the offence, was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death in 1976. After losing his appeals against the death sentence within the next two years, through his lawyer, Mohamad Kunjo filed for clemency in January 1978. Two months later, on 26 March 1978, a Malay newspaper article reported that President Benjamin Sheares accepted the clemency petition, and as a result, Mohamad Kunjo's death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment. Mohamad Kunjo s/o Ramalan became the first person on death row in Singapore to be pardoned by the President and had his death sentence commuted to life imprisonment.[18][19][20][21]
• July 1975: District Judge E.C. Foenander sentenced Suhaymi Harith, 40, Khalil Mohammed Dol, 39, Wassan Sakeebun, 45, and Wagiman Abdullah, 47 a total of 64 years in jail plus 144 strokes of the cane. All four pleaded guilty to 228 charges of housebreaking, robbery and theft committed between 5 January 1973 and 13 June 1975.[22]
• 18 December 1975: After being approached by his sister Patsy Chung to assist her to settle her unhappy marital issues, carpenter Bobby Chung Hua Watt (庄华发) went to his sister's flat in Chai Chee to resolve the issue with his sister's abusive and unfaithful husband Lim Hong Chee. However, this accelerated into a physical confrontation when Lim and his two brothers walked away with disrespect and contempt, and as a result, Chung has killed one of Lim's brothers Lim Hong Kai (林鸿凯). Chung was later arrested and charged with the murder of 23-year-old Lim Hong Kai. In November 1976, Bobby Chung, who was married with two young daughters before the crime, was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death. Chung later lost his appeal against the death sentence, and he was scheduled to be hanged on 18 January 1980. However, on 15 January 1980, 3 days before he was to be hanged for murdering Lim Hong Kai, Chung, then 26 years old, received news that his petition to President Benjamin Sheares for clemency was accepted, and as a result, the mandatory death sentence passed upon Chung was commuted to life imprisonment, effectively making Chung the second death row inmate in Singapore to be granted clemency by the President after Mohamad Kunjo s/o Ramalan in March 1978. After serving at least two-thirds (13 years and 4 months) of his life sentence with good behaviour, Bobby Chung was released from prison in May 1993.[23][24][25]

1977

• 6 May 1977: Siti Aminah binte Jaffar, 18, a former barmaid and her 25-year-old lover Anwar Ali Khan was caught for trafficking 43.5g of diamorphine (pure heroin), which exceeds the mandatory death penalty of 15g. Both were eventually sentenced to death in August 1978. Anwar was hanged in 1983 after President Devan Nair rejected his plea of clemency. Siti was spared with the death penalty and placed her under life imprisonment after President Devan accepted her plea of clemency. Siti became the first woman about to be sentenced to death for drug trafficking, but spared due to an accepted plea of clemency.[26][27]

1978

• 25 April 1978: 18-year-old police national serviceman Lee Kim Lai[28] was abducted by three men from his sentry post at Mount Vernon and forced into a taxi. They killed him for his service revolver and also killed the taxi driver Chew Theng Hin. Just on the same night when the policeman was murdered, a police officer named Siew Man Seng had seen two of these abductors behaving suspiciously around the area where the trio abandoned the taxi; deciding not to return home, he went out of his car and gave chase to the two men, managing to arrest 20-year-old Ong Hwee Kuan (the other man was 20-year-old Yeo Ching Boon) and bring him back for questioning. At the same time of Ong's arrest, Lee's body was found inside the abandoned taxi, and there were 15 stab wounds on his body. Later on, the next day, the corpse of 60-year-old Chew was also found in a drain, further linking Ong to the double murder. Yeo was later arrested in his flat and the revolver was recovered, together with some bullets. The third accomplice of the crime, 20-year-old Ong Chin Hock, surrendered himself soon after. The three men were eventually convicted of murder on 23 May 1979, and sentenced to death. They were hanged on 24 February 1984.[29][30]
• 19 August 1978: Five social escorts – Singaporean Diana Ng Kum Yim, 24, and four Malaysians Yeng Yoke Fun, 22, Yap Me Leng, 22, Seetoh Tai Thim, 19 and Margaret Ong Guat Choo, 19 – were last seen boarding a cargo ship for a party together with three unknown "Japanese" men by a boatman. Since then, the five girls were missing and there were no trace of their whereabouts; before the mysterious disappearance, the mamasan (owner of a Geisha bar) and employer of the five girls was approached by one of the three men, who only introduced himself as Wong. Wong, who claimed to be a wealthy businessman from Hong Kong, asked to be serviced by her girls. Wong, who appeared as an apparently generous and respectable man, brought the girls to shopping, expensive meals, and entertainment. This would last for nine days before the fateful day, when Wong offered the girls to attend a party on a ship with his two associates from Japan. Police were contacted and investigations showed that Wong's identity, as well as those of his two associates, were fake; clearly, there was a possible sinister plot undergoing at that time which contributed to the disappearance of the girls. There were many possible scenarios over what happened to the girls (as there were some similarities between some disappearances happening in both Singapore and other countries like Macau), but they could not be substantively proven. Recent theories suggest that North Korea was involved in this matter, because there were incidents of North Korean agents abducting citizens from other countries which happened on the same year when the five social escorts went missing; furthermore, in 2005, a former US soldier named Charles Robert Jenkins, who deserted the US army and crossed into North Korea in 1965 (where he would live for 40 years before escaping to Japan), claimed that he had seen one of the girls, Yeng Yoke Fun, in an amusement park in Pyongyang in 1980 or 1981. However, despite the renewed interest, there was still no evidence to substantiate this theory. Till today, nearly 42 years after the incident, the girls were never found.[31][32]

1979

• 6 January 1979: Four children between the ages of five and ten were found brutally slashed to death in their HDB flat in Geylang Bahru. The case remains unsolved.[33][34][35]

1980s

1980

• 3 October 1980: PC Nawi bin Saini and another policeman spotted 25-year-old Malaysian Seow Lam Seng and his accomplice 30-year-old Lee Ah Fatt loitering suspiciously just meters from a bank along Tanjong Katong Road.[36] When the duo were searched and screened, Lee allegedly drew his pistol and pointed at the officers.[37][38] PC Nawi then drew his revolver and fired three shots at Lee. Lee continued to struggle with the officers despite being shot while Seow took advantage of the officers' distraction and fled. Seow also discarded his gun as he fled.[39] Lee succumbed to his injuries in hospital while Seow fled to Malaysia and was on the run for 38 years. On 22 March 2018, 63-year-old Seow was nabbed in Penang by the Royal Malaysian Police and extradited to Singapore two days later.[40] On 26 March 2018, Seow was charged for unlawful possession of firearms.[41]

1981

• 25 January and 7 February 1981: Notoriously dubbed as the Adrian Lim ritual murders and widely remembered by Singaporeans up till today,[42][43][44] Lim, a self-professed medium, together with his two accomplices, Catherine Tan Mui Choo and Hoe Kah Hong murdered two children, purportedly as blood sacrifices in some ritual. All three of them were found guilty of murder and sentenced to death. They were hanged on 25 November 1988.[45][46]
• 20 September 1981: 22-year-old lorry driver Ramu Annadavascan and his 16-year-old friend and news vendor Rathakrishnan Ramasamy assaulted 45-year-old boilerman Kalingam Mariappan with a rake. The assault ensued from an argument between both Ramu and Kalingam, and this led to Ramu stopping his lorry at East Coast Park to assault Kalingam together with Rathakrishnan. The two men each took turns to inflict a blow on Kalingam with the rake; the second blow, which was inflicted by Rathakrishnan, was revealed to be fatal according to autopsy reports presented at the trial. As a result of his injuries, Kalingam lost consciousness and fell onto the grass. Afterwards, the two then proceeded to pour petrol onto him, and set fire on him, causing Kalingam to be burned to death. Both were later found guilty of murder in July 1984; Ramu was condemned to death and he headed to the gallows on 19 September 1986, while Rathakrishnan, who was under the age of 18 when he committed the murder, was spared the gallows and detained indefinitely at the President's pleasure. After serving nearly 20 years in prison, Rathakrishnan was released in September 2001.[47]

1983

• 30 June and 23 July 1983: Known as the Andrew Road triple murders, Sek Kim Wah, a 19-year-old conscript, broke into the home of businessman Robert Tay Bak Hong at Andrew Road on 23 July with the aid of his accomplice, 19-year-old Malaysian Nyu Kok Meng. They were armed with a rifle Sek had stolen from Nee Soon camp. All five victims: Tay, his wife, their Filipino maid, Tay's daughter and her tutor were confined to a bedroom. They proceeded to rob Tay's family of their jewellery and cash out money from their bank accounts. While Nyu was guarding the victims, Sek decided to murder all five victims by escorting them one-by-one out of the bedroom in a bid to erase witnesses. Sek proceeded to struck Tay and his wife with a chair and strangled them. Sek also strangled their maid. In all, Sek murdered 3 people. Nyu discovered Sek's murder intentions only when he caught him in the act in another room. Fearing that Tay's daughter and her tutor would be next, Nyu carried the rifle with him and locked the bedroom door upon dashing in. When Sek's repeated requests to open the door was denied by Nyu, Sek immediately fled. Nyu then released Tay's daughter and her tutor. Nyu fled to Malaysia before he surrendered and was extradited to Singapore. Sek was arrested at his sister's home on 29 July, where he attempted suicide when police were closing in on him. During the trial, when asked how he felt when strangling Tay's wife, Sek brought up an incident when he was nearly strangled by someone at the Singapore Boys’ Home until he blacked out. Sek said: “At first I felt discomfort. Then it was very thrilling... as if the lights were being switched on and off.” (Adapted from a 2016 Straits Times recollection article[48]) However, his encounter at the Boys' Home was found to be made up.[49] Nyu was acquitted of murder, but charged with armed robbery and sentenced to life imprisonment and 6 strokes of the cane. Prior to the Andrew Rd triple murders, Sek had also murdered two other people in Marine Parade by strangling them before disposing their bodies near Seletar Reservoir on 30 June. Sek was found guilty of murder and according to the Straits Times article: Sek thanked the court for the sentence, saying that he had always wanted to die on the gallows. Eventually, he was hanged on 9 December 1988 for the murder of all five victims.[50][51][52]
• 31 October 1983: 23-year-old temple medium Teo Boon Ann had brutally murdered 66-year-old Chong Kin Meng in her home while planning to commit robbery. Police investigations led to Teo's arrest some time after the murder (with the help of the fingerprints from a wedding card found at the scene of the crime), and he was then charged with murder.[53] At the trial, Teo denied the murder allegation, stating he was only intending to rob Mdm Chong, and when his plot was discovered, Chong, who turned aggressive and tried to attack him upon the discovery of his attempted robbery; Teo also claimed, at that point, he had to act in self-defence and unintentionally caused Chong's death while engaging in a sudden fight with the elderly woman. However, the abundance of incriminating evidence, especially the autopsy results of senior forensic pathologist Professor Chao Tzee Cheng and the diary entry of Teo's girlfriend, detailing him fruitlessly trying to convince his girlfriend to help him in the robbery and to murder the elderly woman if their plot was discovered, had led to Teo's defence of a sudden fight failing to raise a reasonable doubt over the prosecution's case. As such, Teo was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death on 4 February 1987.[54] Teo lost his appeal against his sentence on 16 August 1988 [55] and he was eventually hanged on 30 April 1990.[56][57]

1984

• 30 July 1984: 31-year-old gunman Khor Kok Soon and his accomplice Toh Huay Seow were looking for any victims to rob in Shenton Way when they were ambushed by police. Toh was arrested, but Khor managed to escape. During the escape, Khor fired three shots at 43-year-old Sergeant (Sgt) Lim Kiah Chin (who managed to dodge the gunshots), one of the three officers pursuing him before he got onto a lorry, forcing the 25-year-old lorry driver Ong King Hock to drive him away from the police. Ong King Hock was found dead with a gunshot wound on his neck inside his lorry, which was abandoned at an alley. Afterwards, Khor, who escaped to Malaysia, was on the wanted list for killing Ong. After spending 19 years on the run, on 27 December 2003, Khor was arrested in Johor, Malaysia and extradited back to Singapore to be charged with Ong's murder and also for firing his gun at Sgt Lim thrice. Khor denied killing Ong, and maintained he never intended to harm anyone though he had used his firearm. In the end, on 25 February 2005, although he was given a discharge not amounting to an acquittal for Ong's murder, Khor received the mandatory death sentence for unlawfully discharging his firearm at Sgt Lim thrice. Khor's appeal against the death sentence was rejected, and afterwards, he was hanged.[58]
• 4 September 1984: 27-year-old Neo Man Lee murdered engineer Judy Quek in the woman's bathroom outside the swimming pool of her condominium she was living in. He was arrested 3 weeks later and was charged with murder. However, after he was found to be suffering from schizophrenia and that he had a relapse on the night he killed Quek, the original charge of murder was reduced to one of culpable homicide not amounting to murder. On 25 May 1989, Neo was found guilty of culpable homicide not amounting to murder and sentenced to life imprisonment.[59]
• 24 October 1984: 50-year-old Lee Chee Poh had just returned home from playing mahjong when she found her 39-year-old husband and Amex banker Frankie Tan Tik Siah dead, and upon the gruesome discovery, she contacted the police. Tan was murdered by strangulation. When the police questioned Lee about the murder, Lee, who was hysterical and full of remorse, confessed to the police that she was a part of a plot to murder her husband, and implicated her 41-year-old adoptive brother-in-law Vasavan Sathiadew (who was also Tan's adoptive brother) in the plot. Vasavan, who was arrested, also confessed to the killing, saying that he brought three Thai accomplices to assault and murder Tan. As such, two of the Thai accomplices, Thai construction workers Phan Khenapin, 42, and Wan Pathong, 21, were arrested by the police, while the third Thai accomplice, only known as Ah Poo, was never found. Lee, Vasavan, Phan and Wan were all charged with the murder of Frankie Tan. Lee Chee Poh's charge was later amended to one of abetment of culpable homicide not amounting to murder; Lee pleaded guilty to the reduced charge and she was sentenced to 7 years' imprisonment. At Lee's trial in October 1988, it was revealed that Frankie Tan was a womaniser who frequently had rampant affairs with various women, including Vasavan's wife, while abusing Lee frequently. Lee, who still loved Tan despite her husband's abuse and infidelity, finally gave in to Vasavan's persuasion to murder her husband after another round of abuse by her husband (Vasavan wanted to take revenge on Tan for having an affair with his wife). The three men who stood trial in 1989 for Frankie Tan's murder – Vasavan, Phan and Wan, did not deny that they had gone to the couple's flat to assault Tan; they all claimed that it was the missing Thai accomplice Ah Poo who killed Tan by strangling him with a rope. They also claimed that their only intention was just to assault Tan for what he did to Vasavan and his affair with Vasavan's wife. Vasavan even further denied his motive to murder Tan and also put up a defence of diminished responsibility (this defence was corroborated by Vasavan's daughter). Both Judicial Commissioner Joseph Grimberg and Justice T. S. Sinnathuray, the two judges presiding over the murder trial, rejected the men's respective defences as they found that all the three defendants, together with the missing Ah Poo, shared a common intention to assault and murder Tan, pointing out the evidence where Vasavan paid the three Thai assailants with money for their roles in the murder, and citing the autopsy results, which stated the force exerted on the rope around Tan's neck was consistent with being exerted by at least two or more people, which brought about fractures on Tan's neck and killed him; it disputed the three men's evidence that Ah Poo was the only person who strangled Tan to death. As such, on 6 October 1989, the three men were found guilty of murder and sentenced to death. They were executed on 23 October 1992. As of today, Ah Poo was never found.[60]
• 2 November 1984: In front of several witnesses, 28-year-old Neville Hensley Anthony killed 19-year-old interior designer Lim Hwee Hwang by throwing her off to her death. After being on the run for more than 2 years, Anthony was arrested in Malaysia in 1987. On 18 March 1987, he was extradited back to Singapore to be charged with murder.[61] On 22 November 1990, Anthony was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death.[62] He lost his appeal on 12 November 1991,[63] and afterwards, he was hanged on an unspecified date.[64]
• 12 December 1984: Ayakanno Marithamuthu's disappearance remained a mystery and his 'murder' was famously dubbed the curry murder. Marithamuthu, a caretaker at the Public Utilities Board holiday chalets in Changi, was allegedly bludgeoned to death in the Orchard Road Presbyterian Church. His body was suspected to be dismembered, cooked in curry, packed in plastic bags and disposed in rubbish bins along the roads. However, his remains and evidence of the murder were never found. His wife and her three brothers were charged in court in 1987 but released in the same year due to lack of evidence. The brothers were arrested again and released in June 1991 after spending four years in prison.[65] The case remains unsolved till today.

1985

• 26 April 1985: Housewife Sim Ah Cheoh (沈亚彩) was arrested together with her two accomplices 30-year-old Ronald Tan Chong Ngee (alias Ah Aw) and 31-year-old Lim Joo Yin (alias Ah Hai), for transporting 1.37 kg of heroin in a taxi from Hotel Negara in Claymore Drive to Changi Airport. All were charged with drug trafficking and transportation of drugs. Sim, a single mother with two sons, was said to have led a difficult life full of poverty and tragedy (including being orphaned at age three after her mother's death).[66] She accepted the job to transport the drugs to United States out of desperation for money to pay her debts.[67] 3 years later, on 30 July 1988, all three were convicted of drug trafficking and transporting drugs, and sentenced to death.[68][69] After spending 4 years on death row, on 25 March 1992, Sim Ah Cheoh was granted clemency by President Wee Kim Wee and had her death sentence commuted to life imprisonment.[70] Her two accomplices Lim and Tan were hanged on 3 April 1992.[71] A year later, while she was serving her life sentence, Sim fell ill in June 1993 and was later diagnosed with cervical cancer in November 1993. Two years later, when she was diagnosed to have only at most one year left to live, Sim once again petitioned for clemency, this time to President Ong Teng Cheong (who started his term as president on 1 September 1993 after Mr Wee Kim Wee's retirement), asking to be released so that she can be taken care of by her family and spend the final moments of her life with her two sons and relatives. The clemency petition was granted and Sim Ah Cheoh was freed from prison on 16 February 1995.[72][73] 6 weeks after her release from prison, on 30 March 1995, Sim Ah Cheoh passed away from cancer at the age of 50. Death has brought an end to Sim's sufferings from cancer, as well as an end to her 50-year-long miserable and poverty-stricken life.[74][25]
• 22 May 1985: Winnifred Teo Suan Lie, an 18-year-old Catholic Junior College student, was the victim of a rape and murder case. On 22 May, she left her house for a jog, but never returned home. Her mother made a police report. Teo's naked body was later found lying in undergrowth off Old Holland Road. She suffered multiple stab wounds on her neck. Her body showed signs of a fierce but futile protest, probably made when she was trying to fight off her killer(s). An autopsy showed that she had been sexually assaulted, and died of massive bleeding from the stab wounds. The murderer(s) were never discovered. The case remains unsolved.[75]
• November 1985: The Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau (CPIB) received a report from Liaw Teck Kee, a former employee of the-then Minister for National Development and Member of Parliament (MP) Teh Cheang Wan (1928 - 1986), who revealed that he had bribed Mr Teh on two occasions by paying him $400,000 on each occasion in 1981 and 1982, for him to prevent the government from buying a part of a company's land. Mr Teh vehemently denied the accusations, and even convinced the director of CPIB to drop the case. After hearing it, then-Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew ordered secret investigations to be held on the double allegations of bribery which Mr Teh faced. Eventually, enough evidence was gathered for an open investigation and on 28 November 1986, PM Lee approved the request for open investigations and the CPIB went to the Istana Villa to confront Mr Teh with Liaw Teck Kee (who disclosed Mr Teh's alleged corruption), and interrogated him over the allegations, due to their satisfaction of Liaw as a truthful witness. PM Lee also demanded Mr Teh to take a leave of absence until 31 December 1986, when investigations ended by then. On 14 December 1986, 58-year-old Teh Cheang Wan was found dead on the bed by his wife, with a signed hand-written letter addressed to PM Lee, in which Mr Teh stated he was feeling depressed by the investigations and allegations, adding he felt it would be appropriate for him to "pay the highest penalty" for his mistake. Autopsy results certified that the cause of Mr Teh's death was suicide from an overdose of sleeping pills. Because of his death, the Attorney General could not proceed with the charges of corruption against Teh Cheang Wan, and he cannot be brought to trial for his alleged corruption. Teh Cheang Wan's investigation for corruption was only revealed in January 1987 where PM Lee addressed the Parliament about Mr Teh's death and his suicide note. And when the incident was once again mentioned by PM Lee in a speech to Parliament as Minister Mentor in 2004, he reiterated it as an example to firmly emphasise that Singapore has no tolerance for corruption. Despite his alleged corruption, Mr Teh's contributions to HDB and also to Singapore as MP and Minister for National Development during his short political career since 1979 were still acknowledged by PM Lee.[76][77]
• 18 December 1985: Known as Ah Huat, Lim Keng Peng had committed theft and fled from the scene of crime. When he was spotted by detective Goh Ah Khia who had earlier attended to the crime, Lim fired a shot at detective Goh's chest and fled. Detective Goh died afterwards. The murder sparked a manhunt for Lim and he was also responsible for the shooting of a restaurant owner in a robbery attempt in April that year.[78] He evaded detection from the police until on 3 May 1988, he was confronted by the police at a coffee shop in Clementi.[79] While they attempted to arrest Lim, Lim managed to pull out his gun. However, the three police officers who confronted him each fired a shot at Lim. Lim did not survive the ordeal.[80]

1986

• 14 May 1986: Two Primary Six students from Owen Primary School, Toh Hong Huat (卓鸿发) and Keh Chin Ann (郭振安), who were best friends of the same age from the same class, were last seen together walking to school at around 12.30 pm. The two boys never showed up in their class, and they were missing since; according to their families and teacher who later told the police, both Toh Hong Huat and Keh Chin Ann were generally well-behaved and had never missed classes before. Police were contacted, and a search was on for the boys (which later extends beyond Singapore, into neighbouring countries like Thailand and Malaysia), with the two boys' families offering rewards for any information on the boys' whereabouts. This case was dubbed the "McDonald's boys case", as the fast food chain McDonald's offered a hefty reward of $100,000 for any information of the boys' whereabouts. There were many rumours and possibilities of what could have happened to Toh Hong Huat and Keh Chin Ann after they went missing, what led to their disappearance (the most probable reason was that the boys were being abducted to Thailand and used as child beggars, with their limbs and tongues cut off) and whether they were dead or alive, but these speculations cannot be proven. Despite the utmost efforts made to trace the two boys' whereabouts, they remained missing till this day.[81]

1987

• 9 February 1987 - 18 January 2000: Throughout a period of 13 years, SIA cabin crew supervisor Teo Cheng Kiat misappropriated an approximate sum of $35 million from his company. Teo joined SIA as a clerk in May 1975, and he was promoted to cabin crew supervisor in 1988. It was his job at that time to oversee the allowance payments to the cabin crew. Teo siphoned money off the payments and transferred them to his bank accounts while doctoring records of the cabin members on the flights, using names of those who did not fly on the various flights etc. to conceal his criminal activities. He also manipulated his wife and younger sister which allowed him to gain control of their bank accounts and able to transfer the money he embezzled to both their bank accounts. It was due to an internal audit error that led to the arrest of the then-47-year-old father-of-two on 19 January 2000. On 30 June 2000, Teo Cheng Kiat was found guilty of 10 charges of criminal breach of trust, and he was sentenced to a total of 24 years' imprisonment.[82][83]

1988

• 16 February 1988: Upon hearing that his elderly foster father Tan Ai Soon was severely assaulted, the angered 22-year-old Koh Swee Beng (许瑞明) gathered 5 people – Tan's 3 sons Tan Eng Chye, Tan Eng Poh and Tan Eng Geok; the Tan brothers' brother-in-law Ng Eng Guan; and their friend Ong Hong Thor – to confront 31-year-old Tay Kim Teck, the man who assaulted the elder Tan. They then chased the man and beat him up. During the beating, Koh, who was armed with a knife, stabbed Tay 5 times; among these stab wounds, two of them were fatal, leading to Tay's death within minutes. All were later arrested and charged with murder; however, only Koh was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death on 20 April 1990, while the other five had their charges reduced to rioting and they were each sentenced to 2 years' jail and 4 strokes of the cane. Although he lost his appeal against the death sentence in September 1991, Koh Swee Beng was eventually granted clemency by the President of Singapore Mr Wee Kim Wee on 13 May 1992 (two days before his execution) and had his death sentence commuted to life imprisonment. Koh was released from prison in September 2005 after serving at least two-thirds of his life sentence due to good behaviour.[84][25]

1989

• 15 February 1989: In one of the rare cases involving the death of a policeman on duty, two men were attempting to break into a shop unit at Block 107, Tampines St 11 in the wee hours when they were spotted by two policemen following a tip-off by a member of the public. When confronted, 29-year-old Ong Yeow Tian ran off while one of the policeman, Police Constable (PC) Chua Yeu Hua arrested his accomplice. The other policeman, 22-year-old PC Mirza Abdul Halim chased after Ong. Ong managed to hide in the bushes before launching an assault at PC Mizra. Ong used his weapon to stab PC Mizra before PC Mizra took out his revolver in an attempt to defend himself. Ong overpowered PC Mizra and shot him in the head before fleeing the scene together with the revolver. Ong fled in a taxi before it was sighted by another two policemen, Sergeant Omar Amin and PC Benny Goh. The taxi was pulled over and out of a sudden, Ong use the stolen revolver to fire at them. In return, PC Goh successfully shot Ong in the abdomen before he managed to flee. The Police Task Force was activated to hunt for Ong. When one of the groups of the Police Task Force was patrolling, Ong who was hiding managed to shoot one of the man on patrol who was saved by a bulletproof vest. He was eventually subdued and arrested. PC Mizra went into a coma. He was given the rare field promotion to the rank of Corporal before Corporal Mizra passed away a day after the shooting. Ong's accomplice received jail and caning while Ong was found guilty for unlawful discharge of firearms and sentenced to death. Ong's appeal was dismissed and he was hanged on 25 November 1994.[85][86] This incident resulted in the introduction of snatch-resistant holster in later years.[87]

• 2 October 1989: A 17-year-old student from Mayflower Secondary School, Liang Shan Shan (also named Leong San San in initial newspaper reports), was reported missing by her parents. She was last seen at her school, boarding her school bus at 1 pm. 12 days later, her highly decomposed body was discovered by NS servicemen undergoing their training exercises at Yishun Industrial Park. The late senior forensic pathologist Professor Chao Tzee Cheng could not ascertain the cause of death: he could not tell whether it was a suicide, murder or accident due to the state of decomposition, some body parts were missing and the injuries he found on the skull and ribs were not sufficient to cause death. Nevertheless, the police investigations narrowed down to one suspect: Liang's 35-year-old school bus driver Oh Laye Koh. Oh was then charged with her murder, purely based on circumstantial evidence. He was initially acquitted of her murder at the end of his trial in 1992; however, the prosecution appealed against his acquittal, pointing out how Oh, despite his insistence that he did not kill Liang or know her whereabouts, was able to lead police to the place where Liang's bag and books were, which was some distance away from where her body was found; Oh claimed he went to fix his brakes at 1 pm when the girl was last seen alive, but it was found that he went there at 9 am; and lastly, the school bus driver even contacted and tried to convince the witnesses to testify on his behalf that they did not see his school bus that day. The appeal was accepted, and the re-trial started on 27 April 1994. Oh Laye Koh chose to remain silent when he was told to make his defence. At the end of Oh's re-trial on 3 May 1994, Judicial Commissioner Amarjeet Singh concluded from Oh's decision to remain silent and also his failure to provide evidence "arose from a consciousness of guilt in the face of the circumstantial evidence". In JC Singh's words, he said to Oh in his verdict, "I am constrained to draw an irresistible inference that you were the last person with the deceased and you had intentionally caused her death and that the deceased's death was not suicidal or accidental. Although the prosecution was unable to identify the unlawful act, it is not necessary, in my opinion, always to do so." As such, JC Singh found Oh guilty and sentenced him to death for the murder of Liang Shan Shan. Oh Laye Koh's appeal against his conviction was dismissed on 29 June 1994, and he was hanged on 19 May 1995.[88][89]

1990s

1990

• 15 May 1990: 21-year-old Kelly Tan Ah Hong and her 22-year-old boyfriend James Soh Fook Leong were attacked by two unknown men while they were on a date at Amber Beacon Tower in East Coast Park. Tan was stabbed on her neck while Soh was knifed on the back. Soh managed to reach the nearest restaurant to seek help for himself and Tan before falling unconscious. Both of them were hospitalised. Soh survived the attack, but Tan died from her neck wound. Unfortunately, as the sole survivor, Soh was unable to picture the faces of their assailants, and he did not know why they were attacked. There were also no murder weapons found at the scene. Till today, the murderer(s) were never caught.[90][91]
• 10 October 1990: 38-year-old Clementina Curci, who migrated from Italy to Singapore with her husband and two children just 3 days before, was found dead by her husband in a bathroom of her bungalow. Her death was a result of being immersed in water and strangulation. Three of the four cleaners hired by the Italian immigrant family to clean the house before and on the day of the murder itself, were questioned by the police. The fourth cleaner, Maksa bin Tohaiee, was not present at work on the day itself because he was sick. Nevertheless, the police still considered Maksa as one of their prime suspects and brought him in for questioning. But Maksa was released shortly after. A month later, when Maksa was brought to the CID again for further questioning, Maksa admitted that he had stolen some items from the bungalow before, and on the day of the murder separately, and that he was confronted by the victim when he broke into the house (without the cleaners noticing) to rob more items, resulting into a fight that led to the victim becoming unconscious from the strangulation. Maksa claimed he thought Curci was dead and out of panic, he quickly placed her body inside a bathtub full of water before fleeing the bungalow. Some of the stolen items were recovered, and Maksa was charged with the murder of Clementina Curci. Despite his confession, at the trial however, Maksa denied signing the confession (he claimed he was forced by the police to sign the confession), and tried to establish an alibi of him going to a clinic and resting at one of his siblings' flat on the day of the murder in his defence against the murder allegation. However, the testimonies given by Maksa's family members about where Maksa was at the time of the murder were all riddled with inconsistencies, resulting in Maksa failing to substantiate his alibi defence, which failed to raise a reasonable doubt over the prosecution's case. As such, on 25 November 1992, Maksa was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death. After the dismissal of his appeal against his conviction and sentence, as well as the rejection of his plea for presidential clemency, Maksa was hanged on 26 November 1993.[92]
• 27 October 1990: A transvestite named Lim Yeow Chuan, alias Susan, was found dead in Bugis Street. His body was riddled with stab wounds. According to witnesses, Lim was last seen with two Indian men. The two Indian men last seen with Lim – Soosay a/l Sinnappen and Kuppiah Saravanan – were arrested and charged with the murder of the transvestite. However, Soosay, who stabbed the victim, would eventually stand trial alone for Lim's murder while Kuppiah was sentenced to 5 years' jail and 12 strokes of the cane for robbery and assault. At the trial in 1992, Soosay told the court that they had a friend Leo Chin Hwang, who had met the victim 2 days before the murder, and revealed that the victim had stolen Leo's gold chain and money; Leo had sought both Soosay and Kuppiah's help to get the gold chain back from Lim. However, when they both confront Lim, Lim did not only refuse to return the gold chain, he also turned aggressive and threatened the men with a knife, even went as far as to insult Soosay's mother. This provoked Soosay into getting into a fierce fight with Lim, and during the fight, while Kuppiah managed to snatch the gold chain from Lim, Soosay had stabbed Lim a few times in order to break himself away from Lim who kept attacking him despite his injuries and to disengage himself from the fight. Lim was said to have pursued the men for a few yards before he collapsed. Soosay's version of events was corroborated by Kuppiah's testimony at the trial. On 2 November 1992, Soosay was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death by Justice M. P. H. Rubin. However, upon his appeal, the Court of Appeal found Soosay not guilty of murder, but guilty of culpable homicide not amounting to murder under Section 304(b) of the Penal Code, and sentenced Soosay to 9 years' jail.[93]

1991

• 4 May 1991: Filipino domestic worker Flor Contemplacion murdered another Filipino domestic worker, Della Maga, and Nicholas Huang, the four-year-old son of Maga's employer. She was sentenced to death in January 1993 and hanged on 17 March 1995. The incident caused diplomatic relations between Singapore and the Philippines to be strained for some years.[94]
• September 1991: Dutchman Johannes van Damme was arrested at Changi Airport after the police found 9.5 pounds of heroin in his suitcase. He was found guilty of drug trafficking, sentenced to death, and hanged on 23 September 1994.[95]

1993

• September 1993: Chong Poh Choon, a Navy regular, murdered his three children at their HDB flat in Bukit Batok. Chong was eventually sentenced to life imprisonment.[96]
• 4 December 1993: 26-year-old security guard Maniam Rathinswamy and his accomplice S.S. Asokan, were both sentenced to death for the murder of illegal moneylender Tan Heng Hong. Some time in November 1992, both Maniam and Asokan murdered Tan and drove Tan's car to Mandai, burning it together with Tan's corpse. Despite the charred remains, Tan's identity was ascertained, as well as the cause of death: the late forensic pathologist Professor Chao Tzee Cheng identified that the cause of Tan's death was a cut artery on his neck (possibly by an axe or any other weapon) and that he did not die in the fire. Maniam, who was eventually arrested and charged in January 1993, claimed at the trial that on the night of Tan's murder, while the three of them were arguing violently over letting Tan to pay back Asokan's commission, Asokan became so agitated that he picked up an axe which Maniam bought the day before to kill Tan, and it was Asokan's idea to burn the corpse, proclaiming his innocence and he himself was forced to help dispose the corpse out of fear. However, Asokan, who fled to Malaysia and got extradited back to Singapore to face trial, stated that Maniam told him to grab the axe and kill Tan when he refused to pay the commission, saying that he did not mean to hit or kill him, and that he was only following Maniam's orders. However, the judge rejected their defences and stated that if they had no intention to kill, the weapons would not have been brought in the first place, and decided that they both shared a common intention to murder Tan, therefore both of the men were convicted as charged and sentenced to death. The two men were eventually hanged on 9 September 1995. This case was re-enacted in "Whispers Of The Dead", a Singaporean crime show which features the notable cases solved by Professor Chao, though some aspects of the case, as well as the identities of those involved were changed for dramatic purposes.[97][98]
• 14 December 1993: In a robbery turned murder, Lee Kok Cheong was murdered in his home. His attackers were only identified and arrested after five years via an anonymous tip-off. His attackers, Too Yin Sheong and Lee Chez Kee, were sentenced to death while Ng Chek Siong was sentenced to eight years in jail, in addition to ten strokes of the cane for theft and cheating.[99][100]

1994

• 6 June 1994: Known as the Oriental Hotel Murder, 25-year-old Abdul Nasir bin Amer Hamsah and 32-year-old Abdul Rahman bin Arshad barged into the room shared by two Japanese tourists - Fujii Isae, 49 and Takishita Miyoko, 56. Earlier on that day itself, the two men, who were acquaintances, went to the Oriental Hotel for a job interview when they both spotted the Japanese tour group which Fujii and Takishita were with, and seeing this, the two men decided to rob the Japanese tourists. Both men robbed and assaulted the two women; Takishita was assaulted by Abdul Rahman and she pretended to faint to escape further injury. When Abdul Nasir attempted to escape after severely assaulting and robbing Fujii, he lost his balance and accidentally stepped onto Fujii's face as he held onto the wall to try to steady himself, causing a facial fracture which obstructed her breathing and caused her death. Despite appeals for witnesses and a police sketch of the robbers being published on newspapers, the case went unsolved for 18 months. In January 1996, Abdul Nasir was arrested for attempting to rob and murder a taxi driver, and his fingerprints were found to match those found in Fujii and Takishita's room. Abdul Nasir confessed that he was involved in the robbery, and Abdul Rahman was later found to be in prison serving a 20-month jail sentence for theft. Both men were charged with murder; however, Abdul Rahman's charge was reduced to robbery with hurt, and he was sentenced to 10 years' jail with 16 strokes of the cane. At the end of Abdul Nasir's murder trial on 4 July 1996, the presiding judge, Judicial Commissioner Choo Han Teck accepted Abdul Nasir's defence that he accidentally stepped onto Fujii's face while he rejected the prosecution's argument that Abdul Nasir intentionally stamped onto Fujii's face to kill her. For this, Abdul Nasir was acquitted of murder, and he was instead sentenced to 18 years' jail and 18 strokes of the cane for robbery with hurt. The prosecution appealed against Abdul Nasir's acquittal. However, by a split decision of 2–1, the Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal. That did not mark an end to Abdul Nasir's ordeal, as he had to go back to court to face a kidnapping charge, which he committed during the time of his remand. At the time of his remand, Abdul Nasir, together with drug trafficker Low Theng Gee (who was later executed for drug trafficking) briefly kidnapped two police officers for ransom before being subdued by the police. Abdul Nasir was later found guilty of kidnapping and sentenced to life imprisonment and 12 strokes of the cane on 3 March 1997. However, the life sentence was ordered to run consecutively with the jail term Abdul Nasir received for robbing Fujii, meaning Abdul Nasir will be serving a total of 38 years in prison (at that time, life imprisonment in Singapore was defined as a 20-year jail term). Abdul Nasir appealed for the two jail terms to run concurrently, but it was dismissed on 20 August 1997. However, in the course of the appeal, Chief Justice Yong Pung How also decided that life imprisonment should be considered as a term of incarceration for the remainder of a convicted prisoner's natural life instead of a jail term of 20 years. He also ruled that this amendment will apply to future cases after 20 August 1997. Abdul Nasir was not affected by this amendment, hence his life term remained as a 20-year prison sentence, and he would still be spending 38 years behind bars.[101][102][103]

1995

• 26 February 1995: Britain's oldest merchant bank Barings Bank collapsed due to Briton Nick Leeson's trading activities, who lost $1.4 billion by speculating on the Singapore International Monetary Exchange, primarily using futures contracts.[104] He was arrested on 23 November 1995 after fleeing Singapore for 272 days. Subsequently, Nick Leeson pleaded guilty to two charges out of three charges of forgery and eight charges of cheating and was sentenced to 6½ years in prison.[105]
• 8 March 1995: Briton John Martin murdered South African Gerard George Lowe in River View Hotel, dismembered his body, and disposed the body parts in the Singapore River. He was found guilty of murder and hanged on 19 April 1996.[65]
• 17 April 1995: 39-year-old Ramipiram Kannickaisparry was found dead in Ulu Sembawang by a jogger. Her face was brutally slashed and her body was rolled over several times by a vehicle. Her 40-year-old lover, Nadasan Chandra Secharan, who was a mechanic working at a country club, was arrested on 20 April and was charged with murder. At Nadasan's van, some gold items and jewellery were found (they were presumed to be Ramipiram's) and a tooth fragment was found at the underside of the van. The tooth was tested to be belonging to Ramipiram's, and the prosecution contended that it was Nadasan who slashed Ramipiram, and ran her over with his van and the tooth got stuck there as a result, and a forensic expert by the prosecution confirmed that the tyre marks belonged to Nadasan's van. However, Nadasan's defence counsel, led by veteran lawyer Subhas Anandan, argued that it was not Nadasan who killed Ramipiram, and the two forensic experts representing the defence stated the prosecution's expert witnesses were wrong to conclude the tyre marks were from Nadasan's van or that the tooth was Ramipiram's and gave their reasons (the tooth, in fact, was contaminated). Nadasan also denied killing Ramipiram, stating that he was on his way back home for lunch on the day of the murder and his 20-year-old van happened to break down, and he took more than an hour to fix the van as it happened to rain on that day itself. Nadasan also added that there were some instances where he and the victim were intimate inside the van, and that Ramipiram had a habit to use her teeth to open beer bottles (the tooth could have possibly broke off during one of these occasions when she opened bottle caps). However, the prosecution produced an expert witness who claimed that it would only take 30 to 40 minutes to fix a van (according to Mr Anandan in his book The Best I Could, in which he wrote about this murder case, he wrote that the witness clearly did not understand the nature of Nadasan's van, and Nadasan himself was not a well-trained mechanic). At the end of the trial, Justice Lai Kew Chai rejected the defence's submissions and evidence, while accepting the prosecution's evidence, and therefore sentenced Nadasan to death for Ramipiram's murder. Upon filing an appeal, the Court of Appeal found Justice Lai's judgement weak and that he had erred in convicting Nadasan of murder in view of all the evidence and arguments from both the prosecution and defence. Unanimously, the Court of Appeal allowed Nadasan's appeal against his conviction. Nadasan was thus discharged and acquitted of murder, and he walked out of the court a free man. Till today, the murder remains unsolved.[106][107]

1996

• 26 May 1996: 23-year-old Asogan Ramesh s/o Ramachandren, together with his two friends, 24-year-old Selvar Kumar Silvaras and 18-year-old Mathavakannan s/o Kalimuthu, murdered 25-year-old Saravanan Michael Ramalingam, a gangster whom Asogan had previous conflicts with. On 27 November of that same year, all three were found guilty of murder and sentenced to death. After losing their appeals against the death sentence on 14 October 1997, all three petitioned to Mr Ong Teng Cheong, then President of Singapore, for clemency on 13 January 1998. However, both Asogan and Selvar had their petitions denied and they were subsequently hanged for the murder, while only Mathavakannan's plea for clemency was accepted by Mr Ong on 28 April 1998. As a result of being pardoned by the President, Mathavakannan, then 19 years of age, was spared the gallows and his death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment (even though he was pardoned by the president after 20 August 1997, Mathavakannan's life term was considered as a 20-year prison term instead of a term of imprisonment for his remainder of his natural lifespan since he committed the offence before 20 August 1997). As of 2013, Mathavakannan was released from prison on one-third remission for good behaviour (under Singapore law, if a prisoner maintains good conduct while in prison, he/she will be granted an early release after serving at least two-thirds of his/her sentence).[108][109][110]
• 26 August 1996: Chua Hwa Soon Jimmy, a 25-year-old army-sergeant of the Singapore Armed Forces, had brutally murdered his 39-year-old sister-in-law Neo Lam Lye and even slashed his 4-year-old nephew Garret Chua. The young boy survived the slashings while his mother was killed. Neo was found with 109 stab and slash wounds on her body. Witnesses (the youngest of them was a 10-year-old schoolboy) told police they saw a man (who was none other than Chua) running out of the flat and into the carpark with his hands and army uniform stained with blood. Based on the description of Chua, police arrested Chua and when he was taken to the CID, Chua confessed to the police that he killed Neo, and revealed that when he was 15, he had an affair with Neo who started it. He stated that he wanted to let go of the past and not wanting to restart the affair again as he was already married for two years and had a daughter. It was likely that Chua killed Neo for fear of having the affair exposed. Chua was then charged with the murder of his sister-in-law and also the attempted murder of Garrret Chua. At the end of the trial on 14 April 1997, Justice T. S. Sinnathuray rejected Chua's defence of diminished responsibility, and find Chua guilty of Neo's murder and the attempted murder of Garret Chua, therefore sentencing Chua to death by hanging. Chua lost his appeal in February 1998, and he was hanged on an unspecified date, presumably after February 1998.[111]
• 4 October 1996: 29-year-old Zulkarnain Bin Kemat murdered his drinking and smoking partner, 51-year-old Madam Jetkor Miang Singh at her flat in Ang Mo Kio. Zulkarnain and Madam Jetkor were arguing before Zulkarnain stabbed her neck with a pocket nail knife and kicked her repeatedly. To conceal his crime, Zulkarnain wiped the table containing his fingerprints. He also discarded the ashtray, but failed to discard the cigarette butts which contain his saliva. The case was initially unsolved as police could not establish concrete evidence that Zulkarnian murdered Madam Jetkor and DNA profiling was not fully reliable. Over the years as DNA profiling becomes more accurate and faster, collection of DNA samples from all convicts was made mandatory in 2002.[112] The case reopened in November 2003, which matched the DNA sample found on the cigarette to Zulkarnian. In 2005, 37-year-old Zulkarnian was charged with culpable homicide and sentenced to 8 years imprisonment and 6 strokes of the cane. His sentence ran concurrently with his sentence of 6.5 years and 3 strokes of the cane for consuming drugs, which was imposed in September 2000.[113][114] After his release, Zulkarnain was arrested again and currently serving a life sentence for drug trafficking since 20 November 2013.[115]
• 6 November 1996: 28-year-old cleaning supervisor Lim Hock Hin Kelvin was arrested following a police report. The report was about Lim had allegedly sexually abused 5 boys ranging from the ages of 9 to 13, for over a year before his arrest. The serial sex offender was charged for illegally having unnatural sex with young boys (the names of the victims were withheld to protect their true identities). Lim, who had two previous convictions for such offences (for the first, he spent 18 months in prison and for the second, he served a jail sentence of 32 months), pleaded guilty to 10 charges of unnatural sex, with another 30 charges against him. A psychiatrist assessed him and found that Lim was a paedophile and had a sexual interest in young boys, and that his condition showed a high chance of reoffending. Bearing this in mind, on 29 August 1997, Justice T. S. Sinnathuray sentenced Kelvin Lim to 4 consecutive terms of 10 years, effectively making Lim having to serve a total of 40 years in prison.[116][117]

1997

• 13 March 1997: In a flat around King George's Avenue, 53-year-old Sivapackiam Veerappan Rengasamy was found murdered in her flat. Her son, who discovered the body, contacted the police. The police then interviewed Sivapackiam's 36-year-old tenant and prostitute Andrew Gerardine, who told them that when she returned home from visit her son, a group of two men and a woman suddenly came to the flat, apparently intending to rob her and her landlady. According to Gerardine's statements, the trio restrained Sivapackiam and threatened her with a knife to look for valuables, but she was later told to leave after she failed to locate any valuables. With this information, the police arrested the three robbers; 23-year-old unemployed Mansoor Abdullah, 28-year-old coffee shop assistant Nazar Mohamed Kassim, and 22-year-old prostitute Kamala Rani Balakrishnan. All three admitted to the robbery, but they implicated Gerardine as the mastermind of the robbery. Gerardine later on confessed that she had indeed collaborated with the three to rob and assault her landlady, due to relationship problems between her and the landlady, as a way to "teach her a lesson". However, Gerardine insisted that she had no intention to cause her landlady's death. Nevertheless, she was charged with the murder of Sivapackiam, together with Mansoor and Nazar who both killed the landlady. In February 1998, the two men were condemned to hang for the murder, while Gerardine, who solicited the robbery that took her landlady's life, was instead sentenced to 8 years in prison for a reduced charge of culpable homicide not amounting to murder. Gerardine's escape from the gallows was short-lived, as the prosecution filed an appeal against her conviction and sentence, arguing that Gerardine's actions was indirectly responsible for Sivapackiam's murder and raise many other key factors which proven that Gerardine was also guilty of murder as the other two men. After hearing the appeal, on 9 September 1998, the Court of Appeal allowed the prosecution's appeal, and sentenced Gerardine to death for her role in the landlady's murder. On 26 February 1999, the three were hanged at Changi Prison. As for Kamala Rani, she was sentenced to 7 years' jail for conspiring with the three to rob and murder the landlady.[118]
• 20 June 1997: Known as the "Duck Den Murder", 19-year-old Malaysian youth and male prostitute Lim Chin Chong murdered his 65-year-old employer and duck den operator Phillip Low Cheng Quee (a duck den is known as a brothel for male prostitutes). Lim fled to Malaysia and was on the run for nearly 20 days, seeking refuge in the homes of his acquaintances and relatives before his arrest by the Royal Malaysian Police on 9 July 1997. He was later extradited to Singapore and charged with the murder of Low. On 1 December 1997, Justice Kan Ting Chiu found Lim guilty of murder and sentenced him to death. Lim's appeal against the sentence was later dismissed and he was hanged on 23 October 1998.[119]

1998

• 11 January 1998: A Bulgarian student, 26-year-old Iordanka Apostolova, was involved in an argument with 22-year-old Shaiful Edham Adam at a housing unit in Depot Road. Using a parang, Shaiful chopped Ms Apostolova's throat together with the help of his friend, 26-year-old Norishyam Mohamed Ali. Shaiful's wife, Hezlinda A Rahman together with the two of them help to dispose her body at a canal near Tenah Merah Ferry Road. Her body was discovered on 13 January, which led to the arrest of Shaiful and Hezlinda. Norishyam surrendered to the police shortly after. Both Shaiful and Norishyam were found guilty of murder and sentenced to death on 14 August 1998. They were hanged on 2 July 1999 while Hezlinda was sentenced to 6 years' imprisonment for helping to dispose Ms Apostolova's body, as well as failing to report the murder to the police.[120][121]
• 20 April 1998: 23-year-old Malaysian freelance assistant cameraman and prop assistant Jonaris Badlishah killed 42-year-old make-up artist Sally Poh Bee Eng over a Rolex wrist watch. He was hanged on 8 Dec 1998 after a 19-day trial.[122]
• 7 May 1998: Two men were consuming heroin at a rubbish centre under a flat in Woodlands when they were spotted by two policemen. In the midst of scuffle, one of the suspects was arrested while the other, 40-year-old Tan Cheng Lock Anthony, snatched a revolver from one of the officer and shot him in the thigh before breaking free. He seek refuge at his mother's flat in Chai Chee before the police located him. The Special Tactics and Rescue (STAR) unit raided the flat the following night. During the raid, Tan use the stolen revolver to shoot himself to death before police could arrest him.[123] As for the suspect arrested, 40-year-old Nonis Royston Aloysius, he was later jailed for 11 months for drug consumption and using criminal force on a public servant.[124]
• 10 May 1998: At a coffeeshop in Lorong 18, Geylang, after a staring incident, a Sikh and prison warder named Jaranjeet Singh was killed by one of the two Indian men confronting him for staring at them while they were talking and drinking beer. The two men, Nagarajan Kuppusamy and Saminathan Subramaniam, both 38, were later arrested and charged with the prison warder's murder. Nagarajan, who was identified to be the man who killed Jaranjeet by smashing his head with a beer bottle and fatally cut Jaranjeet's throat, causing Jaranjeet to bleed to death, was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death. His accomplice Saminathan was instead found guilty of causing hurt with a dangerous weapon and sent to jail for 9 months with caning. Saminathan would later on be serving a life sentence with caning for the manslaughter of his wife's godfather since 2002.[125]
• 26 August 1998: A 17-year-old teenager returned home to find her mother dead in her flat. The victim, 50-year-old Tan Eng Yan, was violently murdered and she sustained 58 injuries in total (among these injuries, 4 of them were fatal); two of her hands were nearly chopped off. Not just that, SG$6,600 worth of coins and SG$2,200 worth of cash were missing from the flat. Tan, who worked as a fruit stall assistant in Tampines, was suspected to have been murdered by someone known to her as there was no forced entry into the flat, and the killer was also apparently injured (as there was a trail of blood left behind outside the flat). With this information, over the next 5 days, the police questioned Tan's acquaintances from the market. One of them was a 46-year-old fishmonger named Lau Lee Peng. Lau, who was injured on his hands and feet, confessed to his police interrogators that he killed Tan and that he did not do it alone; he had an accomplice, only known as "Ah Meng", who helped to kill Tan. DNA tests confirmed there were some DNA belonging to a third unknown person in the flat other than Tan and Lau's, and the police thus set out a manhunt for Ah Meng. However, a few days after his arrest, Lau changed his story, claiming he lied to the police earlier on, saying that he did it alone and that there was no such person called "Ah Meng". As such, only Lau was charged with and stood trial for the murder of the fruit stall assistant. The money stolen from the flat were later recovered by the police. Lau, who was known to be a heavy gambler and raked up huge debts from gambling, seemed to have a motive to murder Tan due to his knowledge of Tan possessing a lot of money (Tan was known to always flaunting her wealth to people around her), and his desperate need to pay off his debts. Having failed to substantiate his defences of a grave and sudden provocation and of a sudden fight respectively, and also due to the inconsistencies in his police statements and court testimonies, Lau Lee Peng was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death on 12 November 1999. Lau failed in his bid to escape the gallows when his appeal against the sentence was dismissed in March 2000, and he was eventually hanged on 1 September 2000.[126]

1999

• 21 April 1999: From her bedroom window of her house in Phoenix Garden, Fairos Banu witnessed her stepfather T. Maniam, a 55-year-old retired police inspector, being beaten to death by two Indian men. This brutal killing was also witnessed by two other people; a maid named Aurea David and her employer Geraldine Tan Poh Choo. Fairos recognised one of the attackers as her mother's 25-year-old boyfriend and Indian national Loganatha Venkatesan. Both Venkatesan and Chandran Rajagopal, the other man seen beating Maniam to death, were subsequently arrested and charged with murder. Maniam's second wife and Fairos's 51-year-old mother Julaiha Begum was also arrested for her alleged involvement in the plot to murder her husband to gain full ownership of the house and full possession of the proceeds from the sale of the house. According to Fairos and her younger sister Sairah (Maniam's younger stepdaughter) at the early phase of the trial, it was revealed there were bitter conflicts between Maniam and their mother over Julaiha's share of the ownership of the house and her share of the money gained from selling the house, Julaiha's affair with Venkatesan and many other factors. This would eventually accumulate into Julaiha plotting with Venkatesan, Chandran and another accomplice, Govindasamy Ravichandran (who would later on become the prosecution's key witness against all the three defendants at the trial) in killing her husband. The three men later hired a truck driver, only known as Mani, to drive them to Maniam's house in order to carry out the murder. After two failed attempts to kill Maniam, Ravichandran backed out of the plan due to his reluctance to carry out the murder and him worrying about his family, and fled to India after he stole some money from Chandran. This ultimately made Venkatesan to join in their third attempt and they managed to kill Maniam. At the trial, both Venkatesan and Chandran denied killing Maniam and blamed Mani for doing so, while Julaiha denied her involvement in the murder, denied having an affair with Venkatesan, and attempting to discredit the testimonies made against her by her own daughters and Ravichandran. Nevertheless, on 14 March 2000, the three were found guilty of murder and sentenced to death by hanging. Their subsequent appeals against the death sentence were unsuccessful, and the three were eventually hanged on 16 February 2001. As of today, the fourth accomplice Mani was never found.[127][128]
• 9 September 1999: At Sian Tuan Ave, a 14-year-old daughter of a wealthy car dealer was kidnapped by three kidnappers: Chinese nationals Zhou Jian Guang and Shi Song Jing, aged 26 and 29 respectively together with their mastermind, 33 year-old Singaporean Vincent Lee Chuan Leong. She was kept in a rented house while they demanded S$500,000 for her release. The sum was re-negotiated to S$330,000 and paid to them before she was released on the morning of 12 September. Just 20 minutes after her release, Lee was arrested at his flat. Separately, the two Chinese nationals were arrested on 14 September. They were all found guilty of kidnapping and sentenced to life imprisonment, with their sentences backdated to the respective dates of their arrests.[129][130][131] Eventually, on 22 June 2020, after spending a period of 20 years, 10 months and 9 days in jail, Vincent Lee was released from prison on parole for good behaviour and is now working as a lorry driver, as revealed by a 2021 YouTube video (those who served at least 20 years of their life sentences in Singapore will have a possible chance of release on parole after a review of their conduct in prison). Zhou and Shi are both presumably still serving their life sentences in jail or out of prison on parole since 14 September 2019 (20 years after the date of both their arrests); both men could have possibly returned to China after their possible releases from jail.[132]
• 15 December 1999 – 2 January 2000: A 14-year-old girl (whose identity was withheld to protect her) was called by her friend Ong Li Xia to Ong's flat. However, that would mark the start of a nightmare for the girl, because she was confined by her friend in the flat for 17 days, where she endured extreme degrees of abuse and humiliation (including being forced to perform oral sex on her friends's pet dog). There were seven people involved – the girl's friend Ong Li Xia, Ong's three sisters aged between 11 and 17 (one of them is named Ong Lay Hua, the others were not named due to their young age), and three other boys who were the boyfriends of the elder two of the Ong sisters (namely Yeo Kim Han, Neo Soo Kai and Melvin Yeo Yew Beng) – in the abuse of the 14-year-old victim. Additionally, the Ong sisters were revealed to have been neglected by their parents (the mother was always at work while the father was frequently in and out of jail for drug offences), resulting in them having unruly characters. After the release of the 14-year-old girl, who was hospitalised for severe injuries, which would leave her traumatised and maimed for life, her abusers were arrested and charged with multiple offences related to the abuse and unlawful imprisonment of the girl. They later received jail terms between two and seven years for the respective charges they faced. In addition, the males were also subjected to caning between 12 and 16 strokes of the cane for their crimes.[133][134]

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