SINGAPORE: Suspicious that his girlfriend was cheating on him and facing financial troubles at work, Lim Song Chua resolved to kill the woman and then himself.
He splashed acid on her face while she slept, slashed her arms with a knife and left her to bleed on their bed. Lim then took sleeping pills and fell asleep next to her.
The woman, then 48, survived the attack in 2020, but had to receive surgery and occupational therapy to regain use of her arms. For months, she needed help to feed, bathe and clothe herself.
Lim, who also survived his suicide attempt, was on Tuesday (Feb 20) jailed for four years after admitting to the attempted murder of Ms Heng Hwee Chay in their apartment in Bedok.
He qualified for the defence of diminished responsibility as he was suffering from major depression at the time of the attack.
Lim, now 62, was then the director of Kinbo Construction and had been in a relationship with the victim for seven years.
He had hired the woman to handle administrative and financial matters at the firm in 2013, and she continued to work there after they started dating.
Although he was still married at the time, they started living together in a rented apartment in 2017. He would return home to visit his wife and daughter on some days.
Lim and the victim occasionally argued when he felt that she was “too friendly” with other men at work, according to court documents.
His doubts about her faithfulness were fuelled by rumours in the construction industry that the victim was in a relationship with one of his firm’s subcontractors.
The victim denied the rumours when Lim confronted her about this. But that did not dispel his suspicions.
Sometime in late 2018 or early 2019, the victim started staying over at a female friend’s house on the weekends because she felt that Lim was controlling and she did not have any freedom.
In 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, Lim’s construction firm started running into financial trouble.
He started to resent the victim as a financial burden, as he had lent her about S$300,000 (US$222,823) since the start of their relationship to repay debts incurred by her ex-husband.
THE ATTACK
On the night of Dec 30, 2020, Lim was lying next to the victim in bed but could not sleep well as he kept thinking about his company’s financial problems and how the victim could have cheated on him.
At about 3am, after waking up and ruminating on his problems, he “concluded that the victim was the source of all his problems and decided to kill her”.
“He did not want her to die so easily, and wanted her to suffer and be in pain. He also wanted to use the acid to disfigure her” because of her alleged infidelity, the prosecution told the court.
He filled a pail with about 1L of acid that was used to clean cement off surfaces in construction projects. He then diluted it with water.
This liquid was later tested and found to contain hydrochloric acid and sulfuric acid, and to be “strongly acidic”, according to court documents.
Lim also retrieved a parang knife with a 23cm blade, which had been bought to clear trees at construction sites.
At about 4am, while the victim was sleeping, Lim emptied the contents of the pail onto her face. She woke up immediately and felt a stinging pain.
A struggle ensued, during which Lim slashed the victim’s arms with the parang seven times. She fell to the floor and remained there.
Feeling weak, the victim asked for water to wash her face and said her throat was irritated. Lim fetched a pail of water and a cloth for her face, as well as a bottle of water.
The victim felt cold and asked for a blanket, but Lim refused, telling her that she “would not feel cold after a while”, court documents stated.
At her request, he lifted her and placed her on the bed. He then took about 20 sleeping pills, intending to overdose on them, and lay next to her.
When the victim heard Lim snoring next to her on the bed, she realised he was asleep and resolved to get as far away from him as possible.
She managed to make it out of the apartment but fainted in the lift. When it reached the ground floor, a neighbour saw her and called emergency services.
Later that morning, Lim was arrested at home.
VICTIM’S INJURIES AND HIS MENTAL STATE
Deputy Public Prosecutors Ng Jun Chong and Huo Jiongrui asked for five to 10 years’ jail, while defence counsel Sunil Sudheesan and Joyce Khoo of Quahe Woo & Palmer sought about three years’ imprisonment.
Sentencing arguments focused on the severity of the harm caused to the victim and the extent to which Lim’s state of mind contributed to his offences.
After the attack, the victim was brought to the hospital. She suffered multiple cuts on both arms, chemical burns on her upper back and chemical burns to the corneas of both eyes.
She received surgery to repair her muscles and ligaments, and was given more than 300 days of hospitalisation leave. She was not disfigured, impaired or disabled by her injuries.
But the attack left “significant psychological harm”, the prosecution argued.
In a victim impact statement, the woman reported feeling scared when taking a shower, being unable to sleep in the dark, and feeling the strain of not being able to work for a year.
Her scars remained visible and itchy, reminding her of the attack, and “the emotions that she felt during the attack, including her belief that she was going to die, are hard for her to forget”, the court heard.
Mr Sudheesan argued that the attack was “a single episode of violent offending” in Lim’s entire life, and pointed to the psychiatric assessment that he is at low risk of reoffending.
An Institute of Mental Health (IMH) psychiatrist assessed that Lim had major depression at the time of the attack that impaired his judgment and self-control, and contributed to his offending.
But he was still aware of the nature and quality of his acts, according to the assessment.
A subsequent assessment in 2023 found that he was no longer depressed, and was aware of relapse symptoms and how to seek help. He was deemed not to be a risk to himself or others.
Mr Sudheesan also said that Lim had the support of his family, who knew what relapse symptoms to look out for, and that he would return to live with his father after his release from jail.
Noting the arguments on both sides, Justice Dedar Singh Gill sentenced Lim to four years in jail, which will be backdated to his arrest on Dec 30, 2020.