Coroner inquiry reveals Ang Mo Kio woman's and daughter's violent final moments

SINGAPORE - The elderly woman's bloodied body had been sent for an autopsy after her grisly death.

But her death was far more gory than initially thought - her eyes, tongue and a part of her right lung were missing.

Police recovered the eyes and tongue a day after the stabbing.

But the portion of lung remains missing, five months after the incident.

This was revealed during on Monday's coroner's inquiry into the deaths of Madam Rosaline Lim, 75, and her daughter, Ms Andrea Tay Su Lin, 51.

In the early hours of June 4, Madam Lim's body was found in her sixth-storey flat at Block 105, Ang Mo Kio Avenue 4. She had multiple stab wounds.

At the foot of the block lay her daughter's dismembered body.

The mother and daughter had a tempestuous relationship from about 10 years ago, when Madam Lim's mother died.

Ms Tay blamed Madam Lim for the death, and felt that her mother was going after her next, casting spells on her so that she could take over ownership of their jointly-held HDB four-room flat.

This was revealed in the statement that Mr Peh Hock Leong, Ms Tay's former boyfriend, gave to the police. He is the father of Ms Tay's daughter, Germaine Ng, 17.

After Ms Tay got pregnant with Germaine, she divorced her then husband and moved in with Mr Peh in Malaysia.

She returned to Singapore about a decade ago.

Mr Peh believed Ms Tay had some form of mental illness. (See report on right.) But investigators found no record of her ever seeking treatment at the Institute of Mental Health.

On June 4, Germaine had been woken by the sound of her mother and grandmother arguing.

Thinking it was nothing out of the ordinary, she went back to sleep.

But she was woken again when she heard a dull thud, and only the sound of her mother's voice.

Her grandmother had gone silent.

When she peered out of her room door, she saw Madam Lim lying in a pool of blood.

Ms Tay was still shouting angrily but was incoherent, Germaine said in her police statement.

SHUT HERSELF

Fearing for her safety, she shut herself in the room and called Mr Peh, who told her to call the police.

Germaine also called the Singapore Civil Defence Force.

Three paramedics, along with Mr Peh, were trying to force the flat's door open when two police officers arrived as back-up at about 4.45am.

Throughout, they could hear a woman shouting in the flat.

Mr Peh told Germaine to throw her keys out of the window, and he retrieved them from below the block to let the police officers in.

Taking the witness stand yesterday, Staff Sergeant (Staff Sgt) Muhammad Faiz Johari said he and his patrol partner, Sergeant (Sgt) Shahrul Hafify Jamil, entered the flat first.

They found the living room lights turned on, and Madam Lim lying motionless in a pool of blood.

All three bedroom doors were closed.

Turning towards the kitchen, they saw Ms Tay standing in the middle of the kitchen.

On seeing the police officers, Ms Tay moved towards the kitchen window.

"We walked quickly to her, but not too fast because we had to be careful not to step on the blood," Staff Sgt Faiz told the court, adding that the officers sensed that she was going to jump, and asked her to stop.

"(We) saw her climb the window, stand on the ledge outside and jump," he said.

As Ms Tay fell, she hit a laundry rack on the third storey. Her legs were severed at the knee.

The officers called for reinforcement and returned to the living room, where they heard noises from one of the bedrooms.

It was Germaine. She was so distraught she kept asking the officers if they could escort her out of the flat because "she didn't want to see the body".

"I took a cushion and blocked her face," Sgt Shahrul said, "while my partner moved a table aside so we could walk out."

During an autopsy on Madam Lim at 10.30am the next day, it was discovered that some body parts were missing.

Police then returned to the scene and found Madam Lim's eyes and tongue at a grass patch at 11am.

The autopsy also revealed that many of Madam Lim's wounds were inflicted after she died.

A knife and a chopper were recovered from the scene.

Summarising his report, investigation officer Toh De Yong said: "My findings are that Ms Tay attacked Madam Lim with a knife and chopper. After that, Ms Tay jumped from the sixth floor of the block.

"The multiple stabs and incision wounds are the cause of Madam Lim's death while injuries Ms Tay sustained are consistent with a fall from height."

When The New Paper visited the Ang Mo Kio block yesterday, neighbours said the sixth storey unit has been vacant for some time.

State Coroner Marvin Bay will deliver his findings tomorrow.

- Additional reporting by Lakeisha Leo and Lee Joon Lei

Woman believed she was under a curse

At least four people felt that Ms Andrea Tay had behaved strangely in the days leading up to the incident on June 4, the Coroner's Inquiry heard on Monday.

The ex-boyfriend

Mr Peh Hock Leong, who fathered Ms Tay's daughter, Germaine Ng, found her erratic since they began living together 18 years ago.

Ms Tay would cut up his clothes for no reason and was always paranoid about his whereabouts.

In May, she repeatedly called Mr Peh, saying that her mother had cast a spell on her. Worried, he and his girlfriend visited her at her workplace.

She did not seem to be her usual self and "looked weird", he told the police. She also told Mr Peh and his girlfriend that "many people were praying and taking her energy".

On June 2, when she met Mr Peh for lunch, she seemed mentally unstable - he said she could not recognise him. She said her mother had cast a spell on her, and that she would kill her to defend herself.

He did not think she was serious as she had made the threat before.

The friend

Mr Peh's girlfriend, Ms Soh Lay Lay, got to know Ms Tay through Mr Peh.

Ms Tay treated her as a friend, said Ms Soh, and they often went out together with Mr Peh and Germaine. They also spoke frequently over the phone.

On May 31, she repeatedly asked Ms Tay who was casting a spell on her.

The employer

Ms Tay had called up her employer on June 2 to tell him she could not come to work because she was under a curse.

She asked her employer to take her to a temple so that an exorcism could be done.

He obliged and took her to one in Bedok where a Thai monk performed the ritual.

The daughter

Germaine, 17, told one of the police officers who arrived at the scene that her mother had "weird behaviour" for two days leading up to the June 4 incident, and that she had previously sought treatment for depression at a private clinic. There was no record of her receiving treatment at the Institute of Mental Health. 

This article was first published on December 2, 2014.
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