Singapore — The Secondary 4 student who was charged with the murder of a Secondary 1 student at River Valley High School appeared in court again on Tuesday (Aug 10) via a video-link.

The 16-year old was remanded in Changi Prison’s Complex Medical Centre for another two weeks for psychiatric evaluation by District Judge Brenda Tan.

District Judge Tan, however, denied his lawyer’s application for the boy to have a brief video session with family members so that they could check on his well-being. District Judge Tan said that this was not an appropriate time for them to talk to their son.

The suspect will return to court on Aug 24.

The boy is now represented by Mr Sunil Sudheesan and Ms Diana Ngiam of law firm Quahe Woo & Palmer, after his previous lawyer Peter Keith Fernando was discharged, a Today Online article reported.

What Initially Happened

At 11.35 am on Jul 19, towards the end of lunch break, a group of students encounters a 16-year-old student outside a toilet. The Sec 4 student is holding an axe and asks the rest to call the police. The students return to their classroom and inform their teacher.

The Sec 4 student then asks another group of students in the classroom next to the same toilet to call the police. The students’ immediate response is the emergency ‘Run-Hide-Tell’ lockdown drill – they go into their classroom, lock the doors and call their form teachers for help.

A teacher arrives at the scene and tells the student to put down the axe. The student complies and is escorted away to a meeting room. Other teachers call the police and check the toilet.

About 10 minutes later, the police arrive and take the 16-year-old Sec 4 student into custody.

Police officers and Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) paramedics find a 13-year-old Sec 1 student lying motionless in the toilet with multiple wounds. They pronounce him dead on the scene.

Mr Chan noted that preliminary investigations by the police show that the two students had not known each other before the incident and that the axe was bought online.

The day after the incident (Jul 20), the 16-year-old student is charged in court with murder and is now on remand for psychiatric assessment.

On Jul 19, once the situation was deemed to be under control, the principal broke the news to the rest of the staff then to the students.

The principal then separately spoke to the group of students who were most affected by the incident.

Murder, punishable under Section 302(1) of the Penal Code, typically carries the death penalty in Singapore.

However, under the Criminal Procedure Code, convicted offenders below 18 will be sentenced to life imprisonment instead. /TISG

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