Man on death row for killing pregnant wife and four-year-old daughter appeals against conviction

Singapore ― A 46-year-old man who was sentenced to death for killing his pregnant wife and four-year-old daughter has mounted an appeal against his murder conviction.

The man, a former property agent, confessed to strangling to death his wife Choong Pei Shan — who was six months pregnant — and their daughter, in their Woodlands flat.

Teo Ghim Heng was handed the mandatory death penalty in November last year after being found guilty of two counts of murder under Section 300(a) of the Penal Code.

A third charge of causing the death of his unborn son was withdrawn then. Teo’s lawyers Eugene Thuraisingam and Johannes Hadi from law firm Eugene Thuraisingam LLP had argued that he should instead be convicted of culpable homicide because of a mental illness.

In court on Wednesday (Oct 13), five judges from the Court of Appeal reserved their decision on whether Teo Ghim Heng should be convicted of a less serious charge. They did not indicate when they would issue their judgment.

Teo, then 42, strangled his pregnant wife with a towel, before using his bare hands to make sure she was dead. He then turned to his four-year-old daughter and strangled her.

He spent one week with their bodies in their flat in Woodlands before setting the corpses on fire, the court heard in a trial that started in July 2020.

The judge rejected the defence’s arguments that Teo was suffering from depression and that he had been provoked and lost control after his wife called him “useless” in front of their daughter.

On Nov 12, 2020, Teo was sentenced to death.

After killing his wife Choong Pei Shan and his daughter on Jan 20 in 2017, he burnt their bodies in a bedroom at their Woodlands flat and fended off her family members until her brother went over on the first day of Chinese New Year and realised something was amiss.

In court, Teo’s lawyers made two arguments:

The first was the diminished-responsibility defence, while the second was a challenge on the constitutionality of the murder provision of which Teo was convicted. The High Court had earlier rejected both arguments.

In response to Chief Justice Menon’s question on whether it was possible for someone to function well in some settings and poorly in others, and yet be depressed, Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) Winston Man said that it would have been difficult to compartmentalise his life in that manner.

“If his financial issues caused him great distress and impairment, it would have been difficult to conceal that in his family and work life,” DPP Man added. /TISG