Cold Blooded Murders Read Free Page B

he lent two pairs of
flippers to William: this was one of them.
    Another important exhibit were the four
books which Inspector Richard Lui of the Special Investigation Section of the
Criminal Investigation Department seized at Ang’s home when he arrested him on
21 December 1964. The books were Atkinson’s Skin-Diving , Hampton’s The
Master Diver and Underwater Sportsman , Ivanovic’s Modern Spear Fishing ,
and Du Ros’s Skin-Diving in Australia . These books, one in particular,
were to play a vital role in the case against Sunny Ang at his trial.
    Altogether, the prosecution called 39
witnesses at the inquiry. Several were from the insurance companies. An
official from an insurance company produced a letter dated 28 August 1963, the
day after Jenny disappeared. It was from Sunny Ang, writing from 57 Sennett
Road, Singapore 16. The letter was read in Court. It said:
     
    This is to inform you that
Madam Cheok Cheng Kid, who is insured with your company bad met a tragic
accident while scuba-diving in one of the islands off Singapore at 5:00 pm
yesterday.
    She is presumed to have been
either drowned or attacked by sharks. Her body is yet to be found. Further
information about the incident can be obtained from Inspector Aziz of the
Marine Police.
    Please acknowledge receipt of
this letter. Thank you.
    Another letter, from Ang, written the same
day to a different insurance company referred to ‘a tragic accident at sea’.
    Mr Coomaraswamy addressed the Court for an
hour. He dealt exhaustively with the functions of a magistrate in an inquiry of
this nature. He explained why he had cross-examined only some witnesses, and he
finally submitted that the prosecution had not made out a case for committal.
The evidence, he said, was not of a nature which would lead a Court to say that
the only one and irresistible inference was that Jenny was dead. Even assuming
she was dead, it had not been ascertained how she died. Even if there had been
a death, there must be evidence that it resulted from a voluntary act on Ang’s
part. Counsel argued there was no such evidence.
    Mr Saurajen adjourned the Court for 20
minutes and then gave his verdict. He said, “Having heard the evidence in
support of the prosecution case, I am of the opinion that on the evidence as it
stands the accused should be committed for trial.”
    Mr Coomaraswamy said that Sunny Ang reserved
his defence.

What is Murder?
     
    Singapore’s criminal law follows
closely the pattern of British law upon which the Singapore legal system is
structured. Over the 140-odd years of Singapore’s existence in a legalistic
sense, first as a British trading post, then as a colony which rapidly
developed after the Second World War into a protected self-governing state
before becoming part of independent Malaysia (Singapore became an independent
sovereign state in August 1965), there had been many murder trials. But there
had always been a body. This was the first time a man stood in a Singapore
Court charged with the murder of a person whose body could not be produced.
    And no one saw the murder. No one saw the
girl die.
    At the time Jenny died, her body swept out
to sea, her air tank probably exhausted and her flipper lost, Sunny Ang was
talking to the boatman. The prosecution argued that Ang did not dive in at all
that afternoon because he wanted to remain in sight of the boatman, his alibi.
It could therefore never be said of him that he went under the water and killed
Jenny. He was with the boatman all the time. By remaining in the sampan throughout
the entire incident he could always say it was an accident with which he was in
no way concerned.
    Thus, not only did the prosecution have to
satisfy the jury that Jenny Cheok was dead, a conclusion to be reached only
through circumstantial evidence, for her body had disappeared, but the
prosecution, by the same means, by circumstantial evidence, had also to prove
that Sunny Ang was responsible for the accident which was intended