Cold Blooded Murders (32 page)

Mr Abisheganaden: May I be permitted to
ask him where he was at the time of the riot?

Judge: No but I will allow you a
special privilege. You may confer with him, but I will not allow you to
question him.

The accused then told the Court that at the
time of the riot he was at the vegetable patch.

Neo Kim Leong swore he did not take part in
the riot. He said that the settlement attendant who gave evidence against him
had quarrelled with him in 1962. He had refused to give medicine to him. He was
then in charge of the hospital. As for the sergeant who gave evidence against
him, he had a grudge because he had caught the accused fishing in the sea.

Lim Heng Soon, aged 24, unmarried, said he
did not take part in the riot, but had seized the opportunity to try to escape
in the boat.

Mr Suppiah began the defence of Somasundram,
Somasundarajoo and Lim Kim Chuan. Somasundram was 23. He was educated up to
fourth standard in English and first standard in Tamil. He had lived with an
uncle. His parents were killed during the Japanese occupation. He said the
witness Chia had several grudges against him. Eighteen witnesses had picked him
out as a rioter. Accused said he could not understand why. He could not
recognise any rioters himself.

Somasundarajoo was aged 24. He spoke
Chinese. He had spent two years in school when his father died. Eight witnesses
had said he was rioting. He denied it. He saw no rioting, just buildings
burning and bottles being thrown about.

Lim Kim Chuan at first complained that he
had a headache, then he decided he would like to remain silent. This was not
good enough for the Judge.

Judge: I’m not going to have it said
later on that he remained silent because he had a headache. If he does want to
remain silent that is a matter entirely for him. It must be completely a
voluntary decision, and not forced upon him by the fact that he has a headache.

Mr Suppiah: Accused says that the
incident took place quite some time ago. He was afraid that he would be
confused were he to give evidence. He preferred to remain silent.

Judge: You are properly satisfied that
this is his own choice, not because he has a headache, or any other reason?

Mr Suppiah: Yes, my Lord.

Mr Chng’s clients remained silent. He called
no witnesses.

Chua Hai Imm was to have given his evidence
on oath. He changed his mind and said he would make an unsworn statement from
the dock.

He said the prosecutor was unjust. “I did
not take part in the riot. Robert Choo has a grudge against me. The prosecutor
is very unfair.”

Tan Tien Lay decided to remain silent. No
witnesses came forward on his behalf. Both were defended by Mr Tann.

Mr Advani then addressed the jury on behalf
of Kwek Kok Wah, who made an unsworn statement. He called no witnesses. In his
statement he said he did not riot.

Teo Han Teck, formerly a seaman, claimed he
had helped Tailford by rubbing his chest. He helped to carry him to the shade
of a big tree, then he bandaged his head with a towel. Teo said he stood up to
help when an officer called upon them to help and told them: ‘You will be
released earlier’. That, said Teo, ‘was one of the golden opportunities which I
seized’. Ng Chuan Puay elected to remain silent. He called no witnesses.

Mr Koh’s two clients, Tay Teck Bok and Aziz
bin Salim (alias Terry) had elected to remain silent, but Aziz at the last
minute changed his mind and gave evidence on oath. Mr Koh addressed the Court
briefly on behalf of Aziz, Aziz spoke English. He had been educated at Bartley
Secondary School and had left in form five, the top form. His father had been
manager of a big cinema in the suburb of Katong. Aziz wore spectacles. He said
he was in the mosque when the siren sounded. Eight witnesses had identified him
as a rioter. He said he couldn’t understand why. They were either mistaken or
had grudges against him. The first witness who said he saw Aziz taking part in
the rioting was Chong Sek Ling, ‘otherwise known as Lau Hor Kia, the Number One
General of the 13 Wonders Secret Society’. Aziz insisted that Chong was
mistaken. Aziz said he knew Cartoon (Weng Loke Hai) had a grudge against him. A
Malay witness also had a grudge against him because Aziz had accused him of
stealing rations from the kitchen. Aziz said he did not recognise anybody
rioting because he never had his glasses on. The Judge observed that he had
worn his glasses throughout the trial. Aziz said he was never armed but he
admitted drinking from a bottle a rioter offered him and having drunk from it
he threw the empty bottle on the grass. A witness testified that he saw Aziz in
the kitchen at the time he was supposed to be rioting.

Mr Jumabhoy’s client, Lim Kim Sian, changed
his mind about giving evidence on oath and decided instead to make an unsworn
statement from the dock. Koh Ah Tiaw remained silent.

Twenty-one year old Chia Tiong Gunn, a
cobbler on the island, gave evidence on oath. He said he ran into the jungle
when trouble started and stayed there until the police arrived.

Chia said that the warder who gave evidence
against him had a grudge against him. They had quarrelled when the warder was
himself a detainee.

Counsel: When was this?

Chia: He stole my sea-shells.

Counsel: Yes. I want to know when.

Chia: In 1961 when he was a police
detainee.

Counsel: What sort of sea-shells did he
steal from you?

Chia: It is a form of sea-shell: we
call it ‘King Kong’. They are coloured shells. They can be displayed.

Counsel: How many did he steal from
you?

Chia: When he was attempting to steal
my sea-shells I caught him.

Judge: You caught him red-handed did
you?

Chia: Yes.

Counsel: What happened?

Chia: I had an argument with him. I
accused him of being a thief in Pulau Senang. He was ashamed and started to
quarrel with me.

Counsel: Apart from this incident, was
there any other incident?

Chia: Yes, when he became Settlement
Assistant he asked me to make a pair of shoes. I refused and he told me to look
out.

Counsel: And you say it is because of
these two incidents that he has identified you?

Chia: Yes.

Kok Teck Thow (known as ‘Bamboo Head’) also
gave evidence on oath. He was 30 years old. He told his counsel that he sent
secret letters to relatives and others through a settlement assistant whom he
identified. This man collected the money relatives sent in this irregular
manner and he and Kok each took a percentage as commission. Kok said four or
five detainees were doing this. Kok admitted that he had beaten up a witness a
month prior to the rioting ‘for dirtying the hall after I had cleaned it’.
Consequently, the man bore him a grudge.

Low Chai Kiat, defended by Mr Braga, was a
secondary schoolboy, a former Boy Scout. He claimed he was no rioter. Indeed he
had gone to Tailford’s assistance.

Mr Braga did not deny there was a riot,
though his three clients, he said, did not take part. The riot was really a
rebellion. They were rebelling against unjust treatment when they destroyed the
settlement which they had by their sweat and toil developed into a ‘showpiece
of the world’. Counsel insisted that the prosecution had failed miserably to
prove the charges against the accused. He argued that Dutton had been
over-enthusiastic and not treated the men as human beings. Low tide came in
twice a day and Dutton had worked the men on the jetty on both tides every
twenty-four hours. Men were exhausted and so hungry that they had even to ask
for bread in advance and to have it deducted from their rations later. Mr Braga
said that human emotions were like the spring of a watch. If the watch was
properly wound it would serve well. If this was not handled with care it would
require repairs. If it was given a final twist it became irreparable. “And so
it was on the day of the riot. The safety valve went loose and the detainees
went berserk.” Counsel said he supported Mr Ball’s contention that Pulau Senang
had not been run under prison regulations as it should have been.

During the next two weeks, from 10 to 27
February, defence counsel made their submissions. On 5 March, Crown Counsel
concluded his address to the jury. Then Judge Buttrose began his summing up.

“You have been told,” observed the
Judge, “that it was better that 10 guilty men should go free rather than one
innocent man should be convicted. Of course it would be better, but that is not
good enough. It is our duty to see that such a situation does not arise. That
such a situation should be allowed to exist and to grow and to develop in
stature would, in my opinion, constitute a grave reflection on the
administration of the criminal jurisprudence of any civilized country. It is,
gentlemen of the jury, more than ever necessary in this present day and age
that the rule of law should be proclaimed aloud for all to hear: that those who
offend against it shall be punished; and those who observe and obey it shall be
allowed to live in freedom and security under it.” He reminded them that ‘it is
on the evidence and the evidence alone, given before you and nothing else, that
you must decide this case’. He told them to dismiss from their minds entirely
the question of some of the accused going sick and holding up the proceedings.
The accused, ‘having been certified as fit, the trial proceeded and the
incident closed. It had nothing to do with the issues with which you are
concerned—namely whether the 58 accused are guilty or not guilty of these three
charges of murder’.

He explained that there were four main
elements of the charge. First, that all the accused were members of an unlawful
assembly. Second, that the common objects of that unlawful assembly were to
cause the death of Dutton, Singham, Tan Kok Hian, Cartoon, Chia Teck Whee, and
others, and to cause the destruction of Pulau Senang. The third is that while
these 58 were members of that unlawful assembly, one or more members of the
assembly committed murder by causing the death of Dutton, Singham and Tan Kok
Hian. The fourth ingredient is that murder was an offence, which the members of
that unlawful assembly knew to be likely to be committed in the prosecution of
the common objects of that assembly.

The Judge gave an illustration of a common
object of an unlawful assembly. “Supposing two persons go out one night to
steal a bicycle which they found on the side of the road and, as they were
taking it away in the furtherance of their common object to steal, the owner
suddenly appears and endeavours to prevent them, and one of them suddenly pulls
a gun from his pocket and shoots the owner through the heart and kills him—and
you will assume, for the purposes of this illustration that the agreement
between the two accused was simply to steal the bicycle and nothing more. Well,
then the man who pulled out the gun and shot the owner through the heart would
have been exceeding the common intention of the two, which was merely to steal
the bicycle. One, therefore would not be guilty of murder, unless it could be
shown that they had agreed beforehand that should the owner resist they were
prepared to kill him, and had weapons with them to do so.

“What was the common object of this unlawful
assembly? Was it merely to riot, attack the prison staff, knock them about,
damage a building or two? Or was it rather to wipe Pulau Senang off the map and
all it stood for, including those in authority and anyone else who thwarted or
opposed this unlawful assembly in achieving this common object, this end? Or
was it perhaps, as Major James told us, an act of open and deliberate defiance
against the Singapore Government to show that Pulau Senang, and those in
authority there, could not contain these police detainees?

What is murder? Murder is committed if the
act which caused death is done firstly with the intention of causing death, or
secondly with the intention of causing such bodily injury as the accused knew
to be likely to cause death, or thirdly with the intention of causing bodily
injury sufficient in the ordinary course of nature to cause death. Murder may
therefore be simply defined as the unlawful killing of one human being by
another human being with any of these three intentions—the intention to kill,
the intention of causing such bodily injury which the accused knew to be likely
to kill, or was sufficient in the ordinary cause of nature to kill.

Every person is presumed to intend the
natural and probable consequences of his acts: in other words that he intends
to do what in fact he does. If a person for example, deliberately and
intentionally slashes at another with a
parang
, or an axe or a
cangkul
, on the face or the head or the neck or the chest, or any other
vital part of the human body, or fires a pistol at point-blank range at another
man’s chest, or pours petrol over someone and sets it alight, you may, I think
without difficulty and not unreasonably, arrive at the conclusion that he
intended to kill him, or to cause him such bodily injury as he knew to be
likely to kill, or was sufficient in the ordinary course of nature to kill him.
And if in fact the victim dies, then murder has been committed.”