Man poured boiling oil on roommate and stabbed him to death, gets life imprisonment
The two men in their 60s had tensions from living together in a one-room flat, including disputes over smoking, laundry and a visiting girlfriend.
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SINGAPORE: Frustrated by the clashes that arose from sharing a one-room flat, a man boiled oil with chillis inside, poured it over his sleeping roommate and stabbed him to death, ignoring his pleas to call an ambulance.
Ng Boon Hong, a 63-year-old Singaporean, was sentenced to life imprisonment on Wednesday (Jul 1).
He wanted to plead guilty to the murder charge, but the judge said he could not record a plea of guilt since the offence was punishable by death.
Instead, Ng was convicted at a brief hearing, during which the prosecution read out a set of facts agreed on by both the prosecution and defence.
THE DISPUTES
The court heard that both Ng and the victim, 61-year-old Ang Cheng Kek, were unemployed.
Since December 2022, they had shared a one-room public rental flat in Redhill Close.
The pair had several disputes while living together. Once, Mr Ang made a police report saying Ng had threatened to kill him after he refused to lend him money.
Mr Ang had a girlfriend he would invite over for intimate relations, but there was no partition in the flat, so Ng had to leave whenever the girlfriend was present.
Ng was also upset with Mr Ang for wanting to give away a cupboard he had bought him. Ng smashed it with a hammer in front of his roommate.
Ng felt that Mr Ang deliberately slammed the door at night to disturb him while he was asleep, while Mr Ang was unhappy that Ng smoked by the window. He also did not like it that Ng hung his underwear to dry in the kitchen.
THE MURDER
On Mar 15, 2023, Ng went to bed and was jolted awake about 40 minutes later by Mr Ang slamming the door on his return.
The pair got into an argument and used vulgarities on each other.
Ng was frustrated and felt he could no longer tolerate Mr Ang. He did not want the latter to die easily and intended to pour boiling oil on him.
He went to the kitchen, filled a pot half full with cooking oil and heated it over the stove.
Seeing some red chillis, he cut them into smaller pieces and added them to the pot, thinking they would inflict greater pain on the victim.
After closing all the windows to reduce noise, Ng took a knife and the pot of oil with him to the sleeping victim.
At about 2.10am on Mar 16, 2023, Ng approached the sleeping victim and poured the boiling oil on Mr Ang’s face.
Mr Ang woke up immediately and stood on his bed, and Ng thrust the knife into his stomach.
The victim bled profusely and asked Ng in Hokkien why he did this. He then walked to the main door and squatted.
Concerned that Mr Ang would press the distress button installed in the flat for elderly residents’ use in an emergency, Ng stood between the victim and the button, ignoring Mr Ang’s pleas to call for an ambulance.
Ng also slashed the victim’s neck and the attack left the floor covered in blood.
After confirming that Mr Ang was dead, Ng took about $$3,000 from him, placed the knife in the sink and washed his hands.
He also threw the victim’s phone into a fish tank to disable it before leaving the flat. He went to a temple along Bencoolen Street where he prayed and confessed to killing the victim, vowing to surrender to the police after spending all his money.
He went to Geylang and spent the cash he had on beer, expensive food and tips for Vietnamese entertainers.
He then checked into a hotel with a woman, drank heavily and fell asleep. On Mar 17, 2023, he took a bus to Chinatown for breakfast before surrendering to the police.
He said he had killed his housemate.
The police found Mr Ang lying in a pool of blood at the flat, and paramedics pronounced him dead that same morning.
An assessment by the Institute of Mental Health found that Ng was functioning in the borderline range of intellectual activity, but did not meet the criteria for intellectual disability.
SENTENCING ARGUMENTS
Deputy Public Prosecutor Colin Ng said that the prosecution was not objecting to a sentence of life imprisonment.
The murder charge Ng faced is punishable by death or life imprisonment. He cannot be caned since he is above 50 years old.
The prosecutor listed Ng’s past convictions, which ranged from extortion, fights in public places, molestation, criminal intimidation and voluntarily causing hurt from the 1980s.
His most recent conviction was in 2020, when he was jailed for voluntarily causing hurt.
Ng was represented by Mr Eugene Thuraisingam, Mr Johannes Hadi and Mr Ng Yuan Siang.
Mr Hadi said his client was deeply remorseful for what he had done.
“One of his first acts was to go to a temple and confess to the goddess of mercy,” he added.
Mr Hadi said the defence agreed with the prosecution that life imprisonment was suitable.
In their mitigation plea, the defence said Ng dropped out of school in Primary 4 and has no children. His first marriage ended in divorce and he lost contact with his second wife after she left him.
He has also been estranged from most of his 10 siblings for more than a decade.
The lawyers said Ng spent most of his adult life in low-skilled, short-term work and lived at the margins of society.
Ng has multiple medical conditions, including heart disease, diabetes and hypertension, for which he takes 18 types of medications daily.
An assessment found that Ng functions in the borderline range of intellectual functioning, about the bottom 5th percentile for his age group, the defence said.
The lawyers added that Ng initially had an amicable relationship with Mr Ang until the disputes arose. Ng had no issues with his previous co-tenant, a taxi driver who died in August 2022.
“Both men lived in a confined and deteriorating living environment with little privacy and limited resources,” the lawyers said. “Mr Ng’s cognitive limitations, isolation and poor problem-solving abilities made him ill-equipped to manage that environment.”
In sentencing, Justice Dedar Singh Gill said that Ng did not want the victim to die easily and intended to inflict pain.
There were 35 injuries on the victim, 24 of which were caused by the knife.
However, he noted that the hot oil did not play a role in the victim’s death, although it would have produced sharp pain according to medical evidence.
Justice Gill said Ng had shown remorse in surrendering to the police and confessing his acts at a temple.
He did not find that the death sentence was warranted here and instead sentenced him to life imprisonment.
Before Ng was taken away, he was allowed to speak to his younger brother, who came to attend the hearing.
Source: CNA/ll(sf)
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