SINGAPORE, Sept 1 — After killing her elderly employers in their Bedok Reservoir home in 2017, domestic helper Khasanah fled by ferry to her home country, Indonesia.
She was eventually nabbed by Indonesian authorities and in 2018 was sentenced to life imprisonment in Indonesia, before the Jakarta High Court reduced the sentence on appeal to 20 years.
These details were revealed on the first day of the coroner’s inquiry today into the deaths of Chia Ngim Fong, 79, and his wife Chin Sek Fah, 78.
The couple were found lying motionless and tied up in their flat at Bedok Reservoir Road on the afternoon of June 21, 2017.
Khasanah, who goes by one name and is now aged about 43, had been working for the couple for less than a month.
She left Singapore at 1.20pm that day on a ferry at the Harbourfront Cruise Centre, said investigation officer Mahathir Mohamad today.
The police received a call for help at about 3.40pm that day.
Testifying in the coroner’s court, Assistant Superintendent (ASP) Mahathir revealed that Chia’s cause of death was blunt force trauma to the head while Chin died from similar injuries to her head and chest.
Khasanah was arrested on June 28, 2017 — a week after returning to Indonesia.
She was overheard talking to someone on her mobile phone about the murder, ASP Mahathir told the court.
Previous media reports stated that a member of the public tipped off the police after hearing Khasanah talking about the murder in an Internet cafe.
She was also overheard saying that she wanted to “repent and stay in a religious school”.
The Indonesian national police arrested her in Hotel Kuala Tungkal which is in Jambi province in central Sumatra.
They then contacted Singapore authorities after confirming her involvement in the deaths.
Items stolen from the Bedok Reservoir flat — previously reported to include two iPhones, a laptop, cash of different currencies, a jade bracelet and a gold necklace — were recovered from the hotel room.
Bloody fingerprints were lifted in the master bedroom toilet in the flat.
The prints were Khasanah’s but a DNA report showed that the blood belonged to Chia, ASP Mahathir said.
After her arrest, Khasanah gave two statements to the Indonesian police recounting the events leading up to the deaths.
ASP Mahathir said that Khasanah admitted to assaulting her employers in a bid to flee from the flat and also confessed to preparing string with the intention to tie her employers up before escaping.
However, he did not elaborate further on these statements in open court.
She was charged and convicted in Indonesia for premeditated murder and theft.
While she received a life sentence in May 2018, she appealed against it. She is now serving her reduced sentence of 20 years which was meted out in August that year.
Khasanah was prosecuted there for her crimes in Singapore due to the other country’s principle of “personaliteit”.
This means that any Indonesian arrested in Indonesia for an offence committed abroad will be dealt with there instead of being extradited.
None of the couple’s family members were present in court today.
State Coroner Kamala Ponnampalam will issue her findings tomorrow. — TODAY
